So far, so good. I can tell just by his expression that he hasn’t contacted anyone.
I’m not sure what we’re going to do next. That’s the captain’s decision, although at some point I have to tell him that the city government knows about us. I’m hoping he’ll just look around and then go back below ground.
I try to lead him in that direction when I ask him if he wants to go higher.
Of course, he doesn’t. He wants to get as close to the old city as he can.
I’m going to stay in control of this cart and keep the right height. If I see locals heading this way, I’m turning us around, no matter what the captain says.
We float several meters above the ground. The air is hot, particularly after a day spent inside the room. Some kind of insect buzzes to my right. The city sprawls below us and around us. It’s familiar to me now, but to him, it must look like some crazy quilt made of the remnants of a place he once knew.
If it’s that familiar at all.
“Where are you?” Al-Nasir says, putting a hand to his ear. I glance over at him.
His gaze meets mine. He looks terrified.
“Who are you talking to?” I ask.
“Mikk,” he says.
I curse. Behind me, I can hear the lieutenant attempting to translate. I don’t give a damn. Instead, I set the cart to hover right here, over just a road and bare patch of ground, and I tune in. I hear Mikk’s voice saying, “. . . locked down. I’m not sure what we can do.”
“Mikk,” I say. “How many are with you?”
“Four,” he says. “Boss, we’re in deep trouble here. I can see the spaceport from here, and there are a lot of official vehicles. Several passed us as we came over the rise. We’re trapped.”
I curse. “Can you get out of the area?”
“I think so,” Mikk says. “No one seems to have noticed us yet.”
“Keep it that way. Come to the caves. I’ll see what I can do. Let me know if there’s trouble.”
“Oh, there’s trouble,” Mikk says. “I’ll let you know if it gets worse.”
He signs off.
I whip the hovercart around and head back to the cave opening.
“What’s going on?” the captain asks. The lieutenant translates, but it’s not necessary. It’s pretty clear what he asked even before he asked it.
“Just like I told you,” I say. “We’re in trouble now. The guides let the authorities know about your little invasion force and now the rest of my team can’t get off-planet.”
“They had two hours,” the lieutenant says before she translates for the captain.
“Yes, they did,” I snap. “And clearly that wasn’t enough time.”
“What will happen to them?” she asks.
“Arrest, a trial for treason within the Empire, probably. And then the Empire will know about you, your ship, the underground room, and the fact that there are now what—five hundred?—people somewhere in the area who not only know how to operate stealth tech, but can repair and build it.” I curse again.
She translates. We reach the top of the rise. Al-Nasir is holding onto the front of the cart for balance, which means my driving is a little shaky, not that I care.
We land near the other hovercarts.
I turn in my seat and lean toward the captain. To his credit, he doesn’t lean back, and most people do when I get angry at them.
And he knows I’m angry.
“You can get out here,” I say. “If you want to be suicidal enough to go into that city, be my guest. But you’re going without me and Fahd. If you want to learn the history of the area without going in, talk to the damn guides. They’re trained in Vaycehnese history. They’ll be able to tell you more than I can.”
The lieutenant simultaneously translates, but neither of them move to get out of the vehicle.
“Get out,” I say.
“What are you going to do?” he asks through her.
“I have no idea,” I say. “I’m hoping they make it up here. Then I’m going to see if we have enough time to get a skip down from the Business—that’s my ship in orbit—to load up the group before the authorities get here. Otherwise, we’re all in trouble. Unless you want to have an old-fashioned shootout like the Fleet of legend, protecting the underdog.”
I say that sarcastically, but I’m half hoping he’ll say yes. It’s our only hope. We need their military might to protect my people long enough for one of my ships to get down here.
His frown grows. “Why can’t they just come with us to the ship?”
I roll my eyes. These people really don’t know the trouble they’ve caused, do they? And somehow I’m elected to tell them.
“Because it will kill them. They don’t have the genetic marker. They can’t go into a stealth-tech field without dying.”
He stares at me as the lieutenant translates.
And then he smiles just a little and shakes his head.
“No,” he says in my language. “No.”
Then he talks rapidly, and I don’t understand a word until the lieutenant translates.
“It’s fine,” she says for him. “Anyone can go in and out of what you call a stealth-tech field—”
“Not anymore,” I say before she finishes her translation. “Something has gone horribly wrong.”
“No,” she says. “If what you say about stealth tech is true, then no one we meet in our travels could go in our ships or onto our bases. We could not interact with the populations we meet, and that’s not true at all. What you call stealth tech is only deadly when it malfunctions. The genetic marker that you discovered only functions in that circumstance. It allows us to repair our own field—and to survive in it, should something go wrong.”
I pause, struggling to understand. “You think my people will survive going into your ship?”
“We’re fixing the . . . drive now,” she says, using a word I don’t know and don’t understand. “Ours is repaired. You watched us work on the one in the room. As Captain Cooper said, it is an easy fix. It should be done when we get back.”
“Should be,” I say. “If not, five of my people will die.”
He speaks. She translates: “They could die anyway. If the authorities shoot first trying to capture them. I take it you do not know what these Vaycehnese will do now that we’re here.”
“That’s right,” I say.
“Waiting for your skip, which might not make it to the planet, is not an option. We will help you.”
“You will attack people you’ve just met?” I ask him.
His gaze meets mine. “We will rescue people who have done nothing more than help us.”
I study him. He seems determined.
Either way, I risk losing five people. If we wait for the skip, all of us could end up in prison and tried for treason.
If we go with this captain, then five of my people could die.
I don’t feel like I can make the decision for them, and yet I’m the only one who can make the decision.
Besides, the Vaycehnese might attack my skip. Maybe more than five people will die.
“I hope to God this works,” I say to the captain.
“It will,” he says. “Believe me. It will.”
* * * *
SIXTY-SEVEN
T
he captain climbs out of my cart, along with the lieutenant. As he does, he snaps his fingers and gives orders in a voice I never want to hear directed at me.
Suddenly six other people join us. The captain gives instructions, and Al-Nasir translates for me before the lieutenant can.
“He wants them in the other hovercarts,” Al-Nasir says. “He says two people per cart, one driving and one with a weapon, would be best.”
A weapon. I frown at the captain. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I almost protest, but then I don’t. It’s better to be prepared. How many times have I told my people that?
“You get in another cart,” I say to Al-Nasir.
“But you need me,” he rep
eats.
“I can talk to Mikk just as easily as you can,” I say. “If something happens to me, you can lead the others to our group. Get them off this damn planet, okay?”
He nods, then scrambles into a different cart. The captain watches, catches my gaze, and nods at me. He approves.
A woman gets in beside me. She’s one of the people the captain has sent ahead. He clearly trusts her. She taps her chest. “Rossetti,” she says.
“Boss,” I say.
She nods, but doesn’t repeat my name any more than I repeat hers. She pulls out that small laser pistol and holds it. I glance behind me. Two people per cart, just like the captain ordered—one in the driver’s seat, the other holding a weapon just like she is.
Al-Nasir is driving, just like I am. I don’t know if he’s ever driven a cart. That should be interesting. But I am not going to watch.
I tap my ear. “Mikk, your position?”
He tells me. They’ve made it away from the spaceport. They’re in a vehicle, but it’s a land vehicle.
“We’re coming for you,” I say. “Take this route.”
I’m going to get him as close to the cave opening as I can. With all of us on the move, we’ll get him here quicker.
I glide down the mountainside, wishing for more power. These hovercarts aren’t built for speed. They’re built to carry cargo and people into different environments, not to go speeding down a mountain toward a spaceport.
But I open up as best I can, not caring if the others can keep up.
As I glide, I see the roads spread before me. The spaceport glows yellow in the distance, the fog lights giving the place an odd tinge even in the daylight.
Official vehicles, with Vaycehn’s city insignia on the side, are speeding toward the spaceport from the city itself.
But Mikk is on one of the side roads, climbing up the mountain. The city officials don’t believe my people would go back to the caves we fled. As far as they know, we’re all trying to get off this godforsaken planet—which we are. We’re just taking a different route than they expect.
I glance over my shoulder. To my surprise, Al-Nasir is the pilot who can keep up with me. The others wobble behind us, uncertain about the speed and the balance of the machine. Instead of clutching the weapon the way that Rossetti is, the other soldiers are clutching the side of the cart.
A cloud of dust heads toward us. Mikk isn’t on the side roads. He’s blazing his own trail.
Two official vehicles have made U-turns and headed on the side road he initially took.
We’re running out of time.
I kick the cart into the highest gear. It dips, and for a moment, I think the power is going to fail. Then it recovers and we head toward that first cloud of dust.
It only takes a few minutes to reach it. I float above the vehicle, see that Roderick is driving, Mikk beside him. My two best people. What the hell are they still doing here?
Then I see their passengers: Lentz, Bridge, and Ivy. Of course, the ones who didn’t quite understand the meaning of “emergency” and didn’t get off-planet quickly enough.
Mikk and Roderick clearly tried to save them.
Dammit.
Roderick stops the vehicle, kicking up even more dust. It gets into my mouth and eyes, and as I cough, I hope to hell that the dust doesn’t have any effect on the inner workings of the cart.
Al-Nasir arrives just as I lower the cart. He lowers his as well.
“Mikk, Roderick,” I say, deciding not to greet the other three. “I want you two to pilot the other two carts. We’re heading back to the caves.”
“Have you called for a skip?” Mikk asked.
I shake my head. “We’re going to try something else.”
The third cart lands, then the fourth. One of the other pilots says something.
Al-Nasir translates: “The city vehicles are getting close.”
“Tell them that Mikk and Roderick are piloting. Lentz, Bridge, you’re with me. Ivy, you’re with Mikk.”
“Gee, thanks, Boss,” Mikk says softly.
“Everyone else with Roderick and Fahd,” I say.
Al-Nasir translates for them. My rearrangements still keep one person with a weapon in each vehicle.
Bridge climbs into my cart, Lentz right behind him. Ivy needs to be helped to Mikk’s cart, not because she’s injured, but because the stupid woman is frozen with terror.
The dust cloud is coming closer. We only have a few minutes.
Everyone rearranges.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” I say, making the cart rise. This time, I wait to make sure the others can get off the ground, that the dust hasn’t had an effect on their equipment.
Roderick takes off faster than I realized a cart can go, with Mikk on his heels. Al-Nasir and I will be bringing up the rear this time.
The city vehicle is so close I can hear the thud of its wheels on the ground. Rossetti has turned so that her weapon is pointed at the city vehicle.
Someone in the city vehicle shoots up at us. I hear the shot whiz by. Rossetti is about to answer with her own weapon when I touch her leg and shake my head. Not yet. If we can get out of this without anyone getting hurt, I’ll be happy.
It doesn’t surprise me that the Vaycehnese are shooting. They now see us as hostile, which makes getting off Wyr all the more dangerous.
“What the hell happened?” I snap as we head back up the mountainside. “When you got the evacuation order, you were supposed to drop everything and run.”
“We did,” Bridge said. “Bernadette and I were at the death hole. We couldn’t get back in two hours.”
“And you, Lentz?”
“I was talking to a friend about the problems here on Vaycehn,” he says. “I couldn’t bring my communicator into the meeting. I had no idea until Mikk found me.”
“Risking his life,” I say, and then bite back the rest. Recriminations won’t help.
Mikk and Roderick are good. Their carts are much farther ahead of mine. I stay back just enough to give Al-Nasir cover. More and more city vehicles are coming in our direction.
A small army is heading up this mountainside, and we’re only moments ahead of them.
“Fahd,” I say into my communicator, “tell one of your people to let the captain know we’re coming in hot.”
“Okay,” he replies.
Rossetti seems focused, as if nothing exists but those vehicles below us. She isn’t shooting, but I’m not sure if the vehicles below have shown the same kind of restraint.
I’m pushing this hovercart as fast as I can make it go, but I’m beginning to doubt that “as fast as it can go” is going to be fast enough.
* * * *
SIXTY-EIGHT
C
oop could see the trouble building down the mountainside. Roads filled with official-looking vehicles. He knew that there would be a small army of people heading up to the cave opening before he officially found out the group was in trouble.
Immediately, he had Dix and Perkins stop interrogating the guides and move them to a rock formation some distance away. Then Coop got his team into position around some of the rises on the mountainside.
He gave the team a simple order: disable the ground vehicles, but not the people in them. He wanted everyone to get out of this with no injuries at best, minor bruises at worst.
The old-fashioned carts were coming in low, and not nearly fast enough. More and more vehicles were joining the chase up the side of the mountain, both on and off the roads.
A few people in those vehicles were standing and firing some kind of weapon at the carts. He couldn’t tell if those were projectile weapons or not, only that the shots didn’t seem to be causing any damage.
He sprawled next to his team, his own weapon out. Then he gave the order to fire.
First they shot up the ground ahead of the land vehicles, hoping that would stop them. But the damn things just bounced over the ruts. So he gave the order to shoot the vehicles themselves.
The carts got closer, and they were full.
That was the biggest problem he could foresee. Those carts were badly built, with technology so old—new? (the idea of that made his brain hurt)— that they might not be able to take the weight of the additional people they’d have to carry.
City of Ruins - [Diving Universe 02] Page 35