CHAPTER THREE
“Did you have a nice shore leave, Captain?” said an unfamiliar voice.
Hunter, slumped on the ground in the line for the shuttle, looked up blearily. By now he was almost used to the way that his surroundings started to spin every time he moved his head. Now if only his stomach would get used to it . . .
It was the young blond tech, of course, looking like he’d had plenty of sleep the night before. Hunter squinted at him through the waves of pain emanating from both temples and meeting just over his nose. He wanted to growl. No one should look that alert and—and—healthy. It just wasn’t right.
“You look a little under the weather, sir,” the tech said, his eyes sparkling, but his expression sober. “Are you all right?”
The kid’s voice seemed awfully sharp. And it sounded like he was projecting, or something. “Don’ talk so loud, kid,” Hunter muttered, searching his jacket for a cigar. A good smoke, that’s what he needed right now. His head felt like someone had stuffed it with cotton and then started playing bongo drums on it, and his stomach . . . he didn’t want to think about his stomach at all. Definitely not.
The kid grinned and took a breakfast sandwich out of his backpack. It was still steaming in its clear wrapper. Hunter watched in nauseous shock as the kid bit into the sandwich, and bacon grease dripped down the side of the sandwich. The spicy smell of jalapeno peppers and bacon hit Hunter’s nose an instant later.
Oh no oh no oh no . . .
Hunter pressed his hand to his mouth as he realized he was losing the battle with his stomach. He managed to stagger to the edge of the landing field before losing it all over the bare rock. By the time his stomach stopped fighting, he was down to dry heaves; his head was splitting so badly he’d have welcomed an axe murderer with open arms, and his legs were shaking so hard he wondered if they’d hold him.
The kid was already aboard the shuttlecraft when Hunter could stand again, which was probably good for the kid’s health, he reflected. I think I’ll kill him if he eats any more of that sandwich in front of me. He tried to walk onto the shuttle with something like dignity, but settled for slumping into the closest seat.
The same laconic shuttle pilot walked into the cabin, looking over his passengers. He took one look at Hunter and handed him a spacesick sack. “Try not to heave all over the cabin,” he advised. “It took us three days to clean out the shuttle after the last guy who did that.”
Hunter nodded, not trusting his guts enough to open his mouth to speak.
The shuttle engines roared into life a few minutes later, sounding and feeling so loud to Hunter’s ears that he might have been strapped to them. The rumbling didn’t help his head at all. He could hear the techie kid several rows back, talking and laughing. He sat back in the seat, closed his eyes, and wished he was anywhere but on a shuttle about to lift at several gees and then go weightless for their trip beyond the planet’s gravity well to the Claw. The shuttle lifted with a sudden pull of acceleration, too loud and too fast, and Hunter was suddenly very glad that the pilot had given him a spacesick sack.
And to think he’d assumed there wasn’t anything more in his stomach.
Unless, of course, he was tossing up his socks. He might well be, by now . . .
By the time they were out of the atmosphere and floating free in zero gee, Hunter was beyond caring. He lay back in his seat and thought about dying. Anything but this! His head had been split open by an axe murderer; every muscle ached; he shook with chills one moment, and sweated with fever the next. He had to keep his eyes closed, or he’d have seen the shuttle doing a little spin around him.
Finally the shuttle slowed for its approach to the Tiger’s Claw, and Hunter felt the craft lurch slightly as the Automated Carrier Landing System engaged. Then the ACLS brought them into the flight deck, as smooth as sliding a fried egg onto a plate . . . Hunter felt his stomach lurch again. No, don’t think about food, just don’t think about it!
Another minute as the shuttle’s engines powered down, and then the hatchway slid open. Two crewmen in the bright green of Medical peered through the hatch, then saw Hunter.
Who was close to panicking. No, not them again!
“Captain St. John?” the taller medico asked politely, as his partner unstrapped Hunter from his chair and pulled him to his feet. From the back of the bus, Hunter could hear the tech kid snickering. “You have an appointment in Medical, sir.”
“Can’t we talk about this, mates?” Hunter pleaded as they hauled him in the direction of Sickbay. “Maybe you could pretend that I missed the shuttle, eh? Just let me go back to the barracks and sleep this off, I’ll be fine in another few hours, I swear . . .”
“You’re scheduled for a briefing in fifteen minutes, sir,” the first medico said, opening the door to Sickbay. “I’m afraid we don’t have any choice.” He spoke over Hunter’s head to his partner. “You get the hypo set, I’ll get the—”
No, not the green goop!
“Come on, boys, let’s not be too hasty!” Hunter said, trying to stagger in the direction of the doorway. “Hey, I’m almost sober now! I can make the briefing! Can’t we—” He tripped and landed on the floor in a sprawl, as the medicos closed in on him from either side. “—talk ’bout this?”
The first injection was just north of his left thigh, followed by a second even further north of that. Hunter yelped and tried to protect that delicate area of his anatomy with his hands. “Gents, please! I’ll have to sit in a cockpit in another hour!” Hunter choked as they prepped the third injection. As a small gesture of kindness, they gave him the third shot in his trapezius muscle instead. Then it was time to drink the “green goop,” which hit Hunter’s stomach like an exploding firecracker, and reactivated the lurching that he thought he’d gotten under control. He barely managed to run to the Sickbay bathroom in time, and heard them turning on the shower behind him. He was beyond resistance as they stripped him down and shoved him into the icy cold spray.
Five minutes later, he thought that maybe he would survive this after all. His stomach had settled; his headache was slowly receding. The only chills he had now were the ones caused by the frigid water needling him. He stood away from it, plastering himself against the wall. “Can I please have my clothes back, boys?” he pleaded from inside the shower.
A hand reached in and cut off the water. They handed him a towel, and laid out a clean flight suit uniform for him on the counter.
The taller medico chuckled as Hunter stepped from the shower, toweling himself gently. He still felt as if someone had scraped the first layer of his skin off, and one of the effects of the second shot was to make everything a little too sharp and clear. “How many times has this been, Hunter? Four? Five?”
Hunter glared at him. “It’s the last time, that’s what it is,” he said, drying off quickly and wrapping the towel around his midriff. “I’ll never give you professional sadists an excuse to work me over again.”
“That’s what you said last time,” the other medico observed. Hunter saw the man’s grin and considered punching him just to wipe that smile off his face, but decided that being taken to the brig by Security would be an even worse ending to what had started as a thoroughly wretched day.
And now that they’d hit him with that third shot, there wasn’t even a chance he’d be able to sleep what was left of the hangover off. He felt like his eyelids had been glued to his eyebrows, and he knew from past experience that he’d be buzzing like a hummingbird for the next twenty-four hours.
“Well, so long and thanks for nothin’, gents,” he said as cheerfully as he could (not very), starting for the Sickbay door.
“Ah, Hunter . . . your uniform?” the tall medico said, holding up the jumpsuit and grinning.
“Son of a—” Hunter grabbed the uniform from his hand and stalked off to the bathroom to dress, still grumbling obscenities under his breath.
###
“As you can see, the probable flight paths begin at Jump Point 1 and Jump Point 2 . . .” Colonel Halcyon glanced at the door of the Briefing Room as Hunter took a seat at the back of the room. “Good morning, Hunter. Glad you could join us.” Hunter winced at the sarcasm in the Colonel’s voice.
“As I was saying, we think the enemy cruiser . . . if there even is an enemy cruiser . . . is approaching from one of these jump points. Of course, there’s a peculiarity in the Firekka System, which some of you may know of, that will make it a little more difficult to track down this Kilrathi convoy. The Firekka System is like the famous Enigma Sector, but on a much smaller scale. Where the Enigma Sector is affected by a singularity that allows you to cross the entire sector in a single jump, Firekka is crisscrossed with different Jump Points that allow you to mini-jump within the system. Depending on whether the Kilrathi know of that peculiarity, we could have a difficult hunt ahead of us.” He frowned. “If there’s even anything out there at all. Tactical thinks that what they detected was a ship jumping in-system, but they’ve been recalibrating their detection equipment, so God knows what could be out there.
“Pilots, even if there isn’t anything out there, we have to make certain. We can’t afford for the cats to disrupt the treaty signing.
“We’ll send out patrols staggered at fifteen minute intervals, following the probable flight paths of that ship,” he continued. “I’m pairing our experienced pilots with some of the newer flyers from the TCS Austin. Iceman, you’re partnered with Doomsday. Hunter, you’ll fly with Jazz. Spirit, take Puma under your wing. All of you, get down to the flight deck for immediate launch. On the next patrol, Paladin will fly with . . .”
Hunter followed the other pilots of the first patrol out of the briefing room, feeling as though his heart was beating double-time. It’s those damn drugs, they make me feel like I’m a live electric wire.
If I can just live through the next couple hours, I’ll be fine . . .
In the lift down to the flight deck, Hunter leaned against the wall, trying to calm his racing heartbeat Spirit, looking too alert and ready in her flight suit, watched him with a small smile. “You look as though you had a good shore leave, Hunter.”
He grimaced. “It was a great shore leave, until that MP dragged me out of bed. And for what? This sounds like a wild goose chase to me.”
“We need every pilot to cover the flight paths,” Spirit said seriously. “The Colonel is right; the treaty between Firekka and the Confederation is too important to risk the Kilrathi disrupting it.”
“Yeah, but why me?”
She gave him a smile that was as warm as a touch, as the lift doors opened to the flight deck, noisy and filled with technicians readying the starfighters for their pilots. “Fly well, my friend, and return safely,” Spirit said quietly.
“Thanks, lady,” he said, and grabbed his helmet from the rack next to the lift doors.
He started for his fighter, and realized that someone was following him. A young man in a flight suit, maybe twenty years old, with a shock of unruly brown hair and dark, serious eyes. His helmet was tucked under his arm, marked with the callsign “Jazz” and several musical notes.
Oh, right. My wingman.
Colson, that was his name. One of the younger pilots from the Austin. Hunter vaguely remembered hearing him playing piano in the rec room a week before. The boy assumed an at-attention stance.
“Oh, God, stand at ease, kid.” Hunter rubbed his temples. His head still hurt, despite all the drugs. “You’re Jazz, right? Jazz Colson?”
“Lieutenant Zachary ‘Jazz’ Colson, ready for duty, sir!” Jazz saluted sharply.
“Right, right. You’re the piano player, aren’t you? I heard you play last week. You’re good. Damn good. Let’s see if you can fly that well. How many combat missions have you flown, Jazz?”
“Two. I iced a Salthi and a Dralthi.” There was pride on the young man’s face.
“Not bad, mate. Okay, listen up. We’re supposed to fly a simple patrol, but I’ve learned that nothing is ever simple, not in this war. You’ll stick to me like glue, understand? We probably won’t run into any cats, but if we do . . . no heroics, nothing fancy, just good flying. Follow my lead, stay close on my wing, and you’ll do fine.” Hunter leaned against the closest fighter for support during this small speech, wishing more than anything that all he could do was go lie down for a while. His brain might’ve been on overdrive from the stimulants, but his legs still weren’t working quite right.
“Are you feeling all right, Captain?” Jazz asked solicitously. “You don’t look so great, sir.”
“I’m fine, I’m fine. Go on, get started with your pre-flight checks. We’re supposed to launch in another few minutes. Once you’ve launched, get out of the landing pattern area and wait for me, ’bout five thousand kilometres to starboard.”
Hunter continued across the flight deck to his fighter, which was still being serviced by the ground crew.
Next to his Rapier fighter, Paladin was talking quietly with a strange-looking young man, his dark face marked with an intricate tattooed pattern. Spirit was having a similar talk with her wingman, Puma, AKA Lieutenant Youngblood. Sorry you got saddled with that boy, Mariko, Hunter thought, climbing up the ladder into his fighter cockpit. Nobody deserves that one.
The blond boy from the shuttlecraft was crawling out from under the Rapier’s left engine as Hunter walked up. Like everyone else this morning, he looked too alert and cheerful. “Ready for flight, sir!” he said, saluting.
And I’m seeing too damn many salutes this morning, Hunter thought grumpily. “Thanks, Ensign, ah . . .” He squinted to see the name on the kid’s jumpsuit. “Ensign Cafrelli. Thank you.”
“My pleasure. And you can call me Jimmy if you’d like, sir.” The kid was obviously trying hard to keep a straight face. “By the way, sir, you look much better now than you did on the shuttle this morning. sir.”
“Don’t remind me,” Hunter muttered, then called louder. “All personnel, clear for takeoff!” He clipped the comlink wires to his helmet, and pressed the button to close the cockpit.
“Hey, Hunter, how’s it hangin?” The wry Southerner voice said into his ear, as the flight control officer’s face appeared, green and fuzzy, on the vid.
Hunter grinned. Of all of the flight control officers, “Mississippi Steve” was the most entertaining. “Just fine, Steve. How soon can I launch?”
“You’re first in the pattern, Captain, with immediate clearance. Your flight plan is uploading to your Nav computer right now. Have a good flight and a safe return, sir.”
“Thanks, Steve.” Hunter finished his pre-flight checklist and strapped himself in, then double-checked to make sure that all the ground personnel were clear of the engines. Then he flipped the switches and thumbed the engines into life.
Even through the closed cockpit, the roar of the engines drowned out all the other noise of the flight deck. Hunter clicked up the volume on his comlink as the entire fighter vibrated, straining against the braking system. Carefully, he pushed the throttle up slightly, moving the huge fighter toward the brightly marked launch strip.
As he maneuvered into position for the launch, the Deck Officer held up one hand, his other hand cupping his headset to listen more closely. Hunter eased up on the throttle, feeling the fighter quivering around him. The Deck Officer brought his hand down sharply, and Hunter punched the engines to full throttle, accelerating forward through the launch tube. A moment later the fighter broke through the magnetic airshield with a bare instant of resistance, and then he was free of the ship and its artificial gravity.
Hunter banked the ship sharply to starboard, easily clearing the landing pattern traffic and heading into open space. A few seconds later he was five thousand klicks out and killed his engines, after reversing the engines briefly to bring his speed down to zero. He drifted there, weightless, waiting for his wingman. It was peaceful, even with the noise of the open com channel chattering in his ear.
This is worth it all, he thought, looking back at the Tiger’s Claw, the sphere of the blue-green planet Firekka beyond it. Just to be out there in space flying a fighter, this is worth all of the military crap, everything I have to deal with in the Navy.
He watched as another Rapier launched from the carrier, veering sharply toward him. There’s the boy, Hunter thought. He’s looking good, has a light hand on the controls. Not overcorrecting, or turning too tightly. I think this one’s going to do just fine.
The second Rapier slowed as it approached his position. The vid flickered to life, Jazz’s helmeted face smiling at him. “Lieutenant Colson reporting for duty, sir.”
“Let’s check out our Nav points in sequence, Jazz. Set the Nav computer for Nav 1, and AutoNav on my mark. Three . . . two . . . one . . . mark!”
Hunter punched in the buttons in sequence, and felt the fighter accelerate as the autopilot engaged. He sat back in his chair to enjoy the ride, glancing at the Nav map occasionally to check their position.
Three thousand klicks out from the Nav Point, the AutoNav dropped out and Hunter took the joystick to resume manual control of the spacecraft.
“No Kilrathi on the sensors, Captain,” Jazz reported over the vidlink.
“Looks like this point is clear,” Hunter said. “Reset AutoNav for Nav 2 . . .”
Jazz’s image broke up on the monitor, to be replaced by Colonel Halcyon on vid override. Hunter stopped in mid-word, knowing that the Colonel never contacted pilots during a patrol unless it was an absolute emergency.
“Hunter, your orders have changed. Set course for your Nav 3 and then keep going another five thousand klicks. Spirit and Youngblood are in serious trouble. Two heavy cruisers with full fighter complement. Get moving, man!”
“Affirmative, Colonel. On my way. I’m sending Jazz back to the carrier.”
Jazz’s voice burst over the comlink, though the Colonel was still overriding the vid circuits. “Captain, you can’t!”
“Listen to me, mate. You’ve flown two missions . . . I’ve flown dozens. What do you think your odds are of surviving this? I’m saving your life, kid. Obey my orders and go back to the Claw.”
“Affirmative, Captain.” Hunter glanced out the side cockpit view, to see Jazz’s fighter peeling off in the correct direction. At least the kid obeys orders. He punched up the new navigation coordinates, and checked his afterburner fuel reserve. He had enough to get himself there on partial burn, with enough to use in reserve for the fight. Fortunately, the main engines on this fighter ran on nuclear cells, so he wasn’t in danger of being stranded. He kicked in the ‘burners and felt the engines vibrating as they soared up to full power. Let’s go, let’s go!
He keyed through the com channels until he heard Spirit’s voice, faint and crackling with static. “Youngblood, where . . . you . . . form . . . my wing . . . NOW!”
###
Spirit rolled her Raptor fighter hard right to stay close behind the Kilrathi, glancing desperately at the power readings on her ship’s neutron guns, slowly building up to full power again. The small fighter’s powerplant was straining to recharge the weapons . . . she waited until the last moment, when the Kilrathi fighter was veering sharply away, to pull the trigger and let loose the volley of deadly red fire. The aft engine of the enemy fighter peeled away and exploded, taking the rest of the fighter with it. Spirit veered again to avoid the debris, scanning her aft view for Youngblood.
She couldn’t see him, either aft or to either side. What she could see were the two Kilrathi heavy cruisers, and the enemy fighters launching from those cruisers, one by one. As soon as they had a full complement of fighters launched, they’d be after her.
She and Youngblood had come out of the asteroid field and into this ambush without warning. Only one more enemy fighter was attacking them now, but in another few seconds a dozen more would join in the fight. “Youngblood, where are you? Form on my wing, right now!”
There was still no sign of the Lieutenant, but his image formed on her vidscreen. “Spirit, I’m on one guy’s tail! Can’t break now!”
“Youngblood, there are too many of them! Form on my wing, we have to get out of here!” She had a clear run now that the fighter attacking her was destroyed, an open path back to the asteroids. No fighters would be able to intercept her before she was in the dubious safety of the asteroid field. At least if she was in the rocks they wouldn’t be able to use their superior numbers against her. In the asteroid field they’d have at least a small chance of surviving this ambush. “Youngblood, do it now!”
“Spirit, I nearly have missile lock . . . I’ve almost got tone . . .”
“Damn it, Youngblood!” Spirit yanked the joystick hard to bring her fighter around in a tight turn. She couldn’t leave him behind, even though she knew she was probably committing suicide by trying to save him.
She lined up for a missile lock on the fighter that he was pursuing, listening for the tone before firing. The shrill lock signal wailed in her ear, and she punched the missile a moment later, already turning to head back toward the asteroid field. “He’s history, Youngblood! Now get on my wing!” she shouted over the com.
“Damn it, that was my kill, Spirit!”
“Get on my wing, Youngblood, or we’re both dead! Can’t you see that they’re launching more fighters, you idiot!”
Looking aft, Spirit saw the heat-seeking missile following the lone Kilrathi as he twisted and dove, trying to break the lock. A moment later, there was a bright flash as the enemy fighter exploded. Youngblood steered into position on her left wing as they ran for the asteroids.
Too late, Spirit saw, looking back. There were at least a dozen enemy fighters moving toward them. They’d be overtaken before they were in the asteroid field. Spirit tried to breathe slowly and calmly, watching the enemy ships approaching in her aft view. The Kilrathi were only a few hundred meters behind the two Terran ships when they blossomed into an attack formation, banking in from all sides to target them.
She felt the vibration of the engines straining at the base of her spine as she flew at top speed, willing her Raptor to leap across the remaining distance and into the rocks . . .
The first two Kilrathi ships tilted down into position behind them, angling for cannon targeting. She saw the burst of cannon fire a moment later, and rolled her fighter to avoid it. “Roll left, Youngblood!” she shouted into the com, knowing that he probably wouldn’t have time to react.
The laserfire caught his fighter on the edge of one engine, which exploded in a hail of sparks. Youngblood’s fighter spun helplessly out of control, back toward the Kilrathi fighters closely pursuing them. Two of the Kilrathi rolled sharply to avoid the damaged Terran fighter; the third crashed headlong into it. The explosion burned white-hot in her eyes, blinding her for a moment to everything else. The shockwave hit her fighter a split-second later, and she punched the afterburners, fighting hard to keep control of her craft.
Youngblood’s image was still on the monitor, frozen in mid-word. His eyes were wide with surprise and horror as the image fizzled out a moment later.
Damn them! Spirit kept her thumb on the afterburners, knowing that her only chance now was in speed. If I can get into the cover of the asteroids, there still might be a chance to get out of this alive . . .
“Hey, sweetheart, what’s up?” Hunter’s voice came through the com a moment before his face appeared on the screen.
“Hunter! Where are you?” She glanced at the radar, and saw the blue blip that was his ship on the edge of the screen. Too far away to help . . .
“I’m in the asteroids, heading toward your last known position. If you can get into the rocks, lady, we can take on these bastards. I’m readin’ five tailing you, with some more coming in from those cruisers.”
“Hunter, don’t do this! Head back to the Claw; you can’t help me now.”
“Hey, you’re not giving up on me, lady! What, y’think you can have a cat-chasin’ party without me? Just get into those rocks, I’ll be there in another minute.”
She hit the edge of the asteroid field at full burn, flying on pure instinct and luck. The rocks were going past her at a blur . . . she dodged and weaved a path through the rocks, yanked the ’stick down to duck under one asteroid. There was an alien scream over her headset and another explosion as one of the Kilrathi impacted against rock she had just avoided.
Cannon fire scorched past her right wing; she swung left into the thickest of the asteroids, slowing her speed just enough so she could dodge the rocks.
She glanced down at her ’scope, and saw Hunter’s blip, moving toward her at top speed. Just a little further . . . a little further . . .
The wail of a missile lock warning ripped through her ears. She looked back to see the missile closing in on her, homing in on her engines. No time to dodge, no time to do anything, even scream . . .
She slammed on the brakes, reversing the engine to come to a hard stop and then killing the engine at the last second. The sudden stop shoved her forward, then back into the pilot’s chair so hard that she thought she was going to black out, but the heat-seeking missile sailed past to explode harmlessly against an asteroid. Behind her, the Kilrathi banked to avoid a collision . . . they’re learning, she thought grimly . . . then the three enemy fighters swerved to come in for an attack run.
Spirit punched on the Raptor’s engines . . . for an awful second, all she could hear was the splutter of her ship’s engines as they failed to ignite. Then they roared back into life and she hit the afterburners. She was beyond the diving Kilrathi a moment later, using the asteroids to block their weapons’ fire. But she knew she couldn’t play this game forever . . . soon they’d maneuver to box her in, to force her in front of their guns, and it would be over.
She banked up and over one asteroid, down and around another spinning rock. The Kilrathi tried to flank her, then one of them broke formation to close on her tail. She swerved left, but not before she heard the warning wail of a missile lock. In another split-second the Kilrathi pilot would fire.
Another Terran fighter soared past her, barely five feet away from her cockpit, the Rapier firing all guns directly at the enemy craft on her tail. Through the cockpit, she caught a glimpse of Hunter’s wide grin. Then her fighter shook with the explosion of the Kilrathi that had been tailing her. Glancing aft, she saw the fragments of the enemy fighter drifting in all directions.
The other two Kilrathi panicked, realizing that what had been an obvious and easy kill was now even odds again. Spirit yanked the ’stick in a hard turn and let fly a friend-or-foe missile at one of the Kilrathi at point-blank range, braking right to avoid the resulting explosion. The last Kilrathi shrieked something in his alien language on her vidscreen as he crashed into an asteroid in his attempts to avoid Hunter’s deadly aim.
“You all right, sweetheart?” Hunter’s helmeted face appeared in her vid. “Are there any other cats after you?”
She nodded. “Yes, but we have time to get out of here, if we move fast. The other pilots will have to find us in these asteroids.”
“Top speed back to the Claw, Mariko. What about Youngblood?”
“He did not survive.”
“Damn.” Hunter sighed. “Let’s get moving, lady. We have a report to file at home base. Any idea why two cat cruisers decided to take a ride through this system in the middle of nowhere?”
She knew what he was thinking. What in the hell are they doing here? She only wished she had an answer.
“No idea. But I am sure we will find out soon, Hunter-san.”
###
The Briefing Room on the Tiger’s Claw was filled to overflowing with pilots and other officers. Hunter and Spirit had to fight to get into the room and find a place to stand. And all I want to do right now is go gel a cold brew, Hunter thought. Damn, but Spirit is still pale and shaky. That was too close.
And Youngblood. The kid didn’t have a chance, from what Mariko was saying. I’m glad I sent Jazz back to base . . . with our luck, he would’ve tried to be a hero too and we’d have two dead kids on our hands.
Colonel Halcyon, looking more harried and grey-haired than usual, worked his way to the front of the room to stand behind the podium.
“As most of you have heard, every single patrol ran into a serious Kilrathi presence in this system,” he began with preamble. “Tactical has no idea why the Kilrathi are arriving in this system in these numbers. Until we have some answers, we’ll need to fly constant patrols to make certain that there are no surprises moving in on the Claw and the Austin. That means twenty-four-hour on-call duty for all pilots, with no more shore leaves.”
A muted groan went through the assembled crowd. I hope I at least have a chance to talk to K’Kai again before we leave this place, Hunter thought. But why in the hell are the Kilrathi moving in on this system? What could they want with Firekka?
###
To descend upon the family nest with her own flock in tow—or to go alone, proud and unashamed of her own individuality. That was the choice that faced K’Kai now. The invitation had been issued this afternoon, the first since her break with WhiteFlower flock to go to space. Now, she had to answer it.
It was a choice she would have to make within the hour. The humans said that the Kilrathi were on the threshold; how soon until they pushed their way into the system? When that happened, her freighter would be in constant use, ferrying supplies for their human allies. She would have to make her peace with her family now, for the freighter would be a prime target for the Kilrathi. She might not get another chance.
K’Kai did not want to think about the possibility that the Kilrathi might actually invade the nestworld. It was easier to do as her people had always done; deal with the current troubles, and leave the future to tend to itself. The doctrine of the Flame Winds taught that the universe was in a constant state of change, and any one of those changes could completely negate anything that had been planned. So there was no point in planning things in too great a detail; it was better to ride the winds as they came.
The current trouble she faced now—reconciling with her family. That could not be left undone, in the face of what was coming.
The flock was more important than any individual; that was what she had always believed. And yet, there was another, lesser-known tenet of Firekkan belief—not of the Flame Winds, but of the Living Spark.
The acts of a leader shape the flocks. The acts of a leader shape the future. And the brilliant leader was more important than the wishes of the flocks, who might be mired in the past. The rebel might be the only one in the flock with vision, a vision that could bring the flocks to new feeding grounds—metaphorical, or actual.
K’Kai’s idol Larrhi, the first Firekkan to leave her planet, he who now flew fighters for the Confederation forces—had he been a brilliant leader, or an aberrant rebel? And she, who followed in his wake, followed his flight to the stars, what was she?
She had gained a flock. Enough to fully crew a freighter.
Was she a leader? Or was she simply a rallying-point for more unnatural rebels?
She thought she was a leader—for that matter, she was certain that Larrhi was. But what did others think of her?
That was what she needed to determine. And if she could, change their minds.
She decided to go without her flock; as herself. After all, it was no secret that her flock existed—and if she went with them, it might be perceived as a power-play, bringing in her adherents to tip the balance of power in the family flock.
So she contacted the WhiteFlower messenger and told him she would be coming for a short visit at mainmeal time, then ordered a complete shakedown of the freighter; it would need such a thing soon anyway, and if the conflicts within the system increased, there would be no time for one. That would keep her fledglings busy; busy enough that they would not miss her for a few hours.
She waited in her command chair on the bridge, one specially adapted to an avian form, and as much supporting perch as chair, watching her energetic flock through the monitors as they stripped and polished, checked and replaced, repaired and repainted. When they seemed to be completely wrapped up in their work, she left the bridge as if she were going somewhere else within the ship—but instead, she left the ship altogether, still in her adopted uniform, and headed for the WhiteFlower family tower.
She was met by her father, which was a good omen, and conducted to the family roost by not only her father, but by most of the younger members of the flock. And from the conversation over mainmeal, her “defection” from WhiteFlower might never have happened.
So—they had chosen to ignore her strange behavior rather than deal with it. In a way, that was heartening. At least it meant that the flock had not chosen to consider her as being cast out.
K’Kai was patient, as patient as anyone who had to deal with the humans must be. If it took time for them to come to terms with what she had done, so be it.
But after mainmeal, she was fair game for the entire flock. The flock-dance that followed gave any of them ample opportunity to accost her when the patterns of the dance left her roosting until her turn came around again.
There was always the same question: “Everything we need is here—why go out there? Where there are no winds to carry you, and you do not fly on your own two wings but inside a steel egg?”
She tried to answer them; tried to convey her dream, which had begun when she learned that Larrhi, a Firekkan male, had left their planet for the stars. Tried to explain her own excitement with sailing the invisible winds between the stars, the power and delight in trusting herself to something larger and infinitely stronger than she was, and making it do her will. Tried to show them the thrill of seeing what no Firekkan had ever seen with her own eyes before. But she knew it was hopeless; even her own crew had trouble grasping some of what she felt. They were often as completely Firekkan in their outlook as the most orthodox of WhiteFlower flock. Sometimes she thought that the only difference between her flock and WhiteFlower was that her collection of misfits had responded to something she could not calculate—her charisma, or her enthusiasm, perhaps—and had chosen her as their leader instead of someone with less of a presence.
Finally, she dropped out of the dance and took a perch a little out of the way of the rest. She watched her relatives swirling in the decorous patterns, lost in something that was older than anyone had been able to trace. Perhaps it even went back to their days of pre-sentience.
Perhaps that was why she was unable to lose herself in those patterns. She was one who made patterns, not one who followed them.
“Aunt?” came a small, soft chirp from below her. “May I come up, Aunt?”
She looked down, her thoughts disrupted. It was her young niece, Rikik, still in her juvenile plumage. K’Kai whistled her approval, and Rikik flapped awkwardly to a perch beside her.
“What can I do for you, brancher?” she asked, fondly, giving her niece the title of one about to leave the nest.
Rikik roused her feathers with pleasure, and preened to cover it. “Tell me about flying the spaceship,” she said, eagerly. “Tell me about the stars.”
Well, that was a new request, and one that K’Kai was quite willing to grant. She did her best to give her niece the answers to every question, describing the thrill of spaceflight and likening it to creating a new dance; recounting some of her experiences among the humans and others. Rikik drew closer, prompting her aunt to groom her affectionately as she continued her stories.
Finally, Rikik sighed and drooped on her perch. “I would like to fly off into space as you are,” she said wistfully. “I would like to see these metal nests that the humans make—to look out and see the stars so bright in all that night-dark. I would like to be like Larrhi . . .”She sighed again. “It cannot happen, though.”
K’Kai nodded sympathetically. Already Rikik’s mother had chosen this fledgling to succeed her as WhiteFlower leader, and presumably as leader of the massed flocks as well. K’Kai knew her sister only too well; if it had been Kree’Kai that had been the leader when K’Kai had made her bid for freedom and space, there would be no Firekkan-crewed freighter now. It was impossible to get Kree’Kai to change her mind once it was made up, and she was the most orthodox of any Firekkan in K’Kai’s acquaintance. There was no spaceflight in Rikik’s future—not unless politics required her to make a flight as a passenger. And even then, it would be as brief a journey as could be arranged.
K’Kai saw the disappointment in her niece’s eyes, and preened her carefully as a wordless expression of sympathy. But before she could say anything, Kree’Kai spotted her niece conversing with her renegade aunt, and called her back to the dance with an irritated squawk.
And a look that could have left scorched feathers, if K’Kai were not impervious to her sister’s looks already. But the encounter left her feeling very depressed, and before long she took her formal leave and returned to her ship.
As she mounted the ramp to her ship, she realized that she felt more eagerness to return there than she had been to return to the WhiteFlower nest. The ship felt more like home than the nest did.
And that only left her wondering, as she took her perch in the command chair with real relief, and saw that her flock was still hard at work at their tasks. Was this what Larrhi felt?
And would she ever be truly accepted—or feel comfortable among her own people—again?