At her side, Epimetheus growled, ready for a battle. Lailani reached out and gave him a reassuring pat—mostly to reassure herself. Her Doberman was only a year old, but he already outweighed her. He had fought at her side all his life, saving her from sinking into madness and pain. Yet how could Epi help her now?
The saucers flew closer.
Closer still.
"Damn it!" Lailani shouted. Last time the saucers had chased her, she had lost them in an asteroid field. But there was nary a pebble for light-years around this area of space.
Blasts flew from the saucers.
Lailani cursed and dipped, and a bolt skimmed Ryujin's roof. The hull heated up and creaked. Another blast hit their side, and they careened. Lailani gripped the controls with all her might, struggling to steady their flight.
She zigzagged, flew up and down, swooped and spun, but she couldn't dodge the enemy. Not here in open space. Not with those ships faster than her.
A third blast hit the back of the Ryujin, and smoke filled the cabin, and fire roared. The engines jolted and coughed and belched out flame. The artificial gravity died, and objects floated across the Ryujin. Lailani started to float, grabbed the armrest, and cursed the lack of seat belts.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" She groaned. "I have no asteroids to hide behind. I'm flying as fast as I can. I can't fight them all. And there's no world for light-years around. I need to go faster. Faster! Warp speed isn't fast enough. I need—"
A wormhole, she thought, inhaling sharply.
She dipped sharply, dodging another volley. Missiles exploded overhead. The saucers stormed closer.
A wormhole. Of course! During the Marauder War, she had flown through wormholes, traveling the ancient Tree of Light, a celestial network of highways built by ancient aliens. A wormhole could transport her many light-years within instants.
Another blast flew.
A missile burst overhead, raining shrapnel onto the Ryujin, nearly piercing the hull.
"Epi, where's my damn tablet?" Lailani shouted. "I have a map of the Tree of Light there. Epi, fetch tablet!"
With the gravity dead, everything was floating through the ship: her pens, Marco's books, the framed photograph of her platoon, her mug, a blob of spilled hot chocolate, an assortment of weapons, and a hundred other items. Where was her damn tablet?
"Epi, tablet!" she said. "Fetch!"
Loyal Epimetheus leaped into action. The Doberman floated through the ship, dog-paddling through zero gravity. With his snout, he sorted through the floating items, finally retrieving her tablet. He swam back toward her, tablet in mouth.
She grabbed it and wiped off his drool.
Another blast flew from the saucers. Lailani swerved, narrowly dodging the blow.
She floated up from her seat—and away from the controls.
Damn it!
She grabbed the seat with one hand, pulling herself back down, but had to release the tablet. It floated away again.
Crap!
She needed at least four hands for this. She couldn't fly, hold herself down, and operate the tablet at once. She groaned, gripped the controls with both hands, and focused on dodging the new volley. The saucers kept gaining on her. Soon they were almost close enough to ram her.
"Epi, hold me down!" she said. "Paws on my shoulders!"
She wasn't sure he understood. He was a genius, of course, but still just a dog. She released the controls for a moment, gripped his paws, and pulled them onto her shoulders.
"Like this! Hold me down."
Thankfully, he seemed to understand. The beast weighed over a hundred pounds, and he pinned her into her seat, shoving against the ceiling with his legs.
Lailani flew with one hand, operating her tablet with the other. A hologram bloomed out from the tablet, displaying the Tree of Light, the galactic pathway of wormholes. Her friend Keemaji had drawn this map for her. She wished he were here; his four arms would have come in handy.
"There!" Lailani said, pointing at a spot in the hologram. "An entrance to the network! Only a fraction of a light-year away." She winced. "Even at warp speed, with a small and fast ship like this, it'll take a good fifteen minutes to get there." She tugged the yoke, changing course. "No choice, Epi. We're gonna have to survive it. Get ready for a hell run."
She twisted knobs, lowering the life support to a minimum.
With a grimace, she shut off all power to the shields.
She diverted every last drop of power to speed.
They stormed forth.
Behind, the saucers followed.
When HOBBS had been conscious, he had been able to lean out the airlock, firing missiles at enemies. Lailani still had her front cannons, but she dared not turn around to engage the enemy. She focused on flying forward, just to reach that wormhole, to vanish into the labyrinth.
Another blast grazed them, chipping a wing.
The seconds ticked down.
"God damn it."
She'd have to fight from the airlock herself.
That left her without a pilot. Epi still struggled with roll over; she doubted she could train him to fly.
But maybe . . .
She nodded.
She typed madly, coding a quick algorithm. It would fly the Ryujin in a random zigzagging pattern. It wasn't accurate. It wouldn't know how to dodge specific attacks. It largely relied on luck.
It would have to do.
She activated the algorithm, and the Ryujin began zigzagging forth, jerking madly from side to side.
Lailani leaped out from her seat, dived through the hull, and swam through zero gravity toward the closet. She pulled on her spacesuit as the ship swerved through space, as the enemy fire flew above and below them.
She knelt over HOBBS. The cyborg was still unconscious.
"Sorry, buddy," she whispered, bringing a screwdriver to his shoulder.
It couldn't have taken more than two minutes. It seemed two lifetimes. Finally she had unscrewed the missile launcher from his shoulder. She raced toward the airlock, leaned out into space, and saw the saucers in the distance.
She aimed.
Her missile launcher locked on a target.
She fired.
The Ryujin jerked, her zigzagging algorithm yanking it roughly to the left.
Lailani's missile flew wide and missed.
She cursed.
A laser blast flew her way. She pulled back into the airlock, and the enemy fire raged only meters away, blinding her, melting the plastic buckles on her spacesuit.
She reloaded her missile launcher. She aimed. A beep sounded—locked on target.
She fired.
This time she hit.
An explosion rocked a saucer. The enemy ship veered off course and slammed into another vessel. Lailani fired again, hitting the tilting saucers, and explosions shook them.
The two saucers fell apart, showering shrapnel over the rest of the enemy fleet.
Lailani whooped, raced back to the cockpit, and tweaked her flight. The wormhole was closer now. She was ten minutes away.
Metal shattered.
A blast skimmed the Ryujin's belly, searing through the hull, exposing them to space.
Air shrieked, spilling out into the vacuum.
Fuck!
Lailani raced toward the breached hull, rummaged through the closet, and found her emergency sealing kit. Thankfully, the breach was only the size of a bullet hole. She worked in a fervor, sealing the breach. She was wearing a space suit. Epimetheus was not. She managed to lock in enough air, but she had to race back to the cockpit, to ramp up the air production, and that cost them speed, and more blasts were flying.
She leaped back into the airlock.
She fired another missile. She fired again. She hit a saucer.
She raced back to the cockpit. There was enough air now. She switched off life support, giving them a boost of speed. They roared forth. Three minutes to arrival.
A blast slammed against their back, and the auto-pilot system
died.
Lailani yowled in frustration. She gripped the controls and focused on flying. No more fighting for now.
They stormed forth. The saucers grew closer. Closer. Soon they were only a kilometer away. Then mere meters away.
A saucer rammed into the Ryujin.
Her tiny starship jolted forward.
Saucers flew all around her, zipping above, below, at her sides.
They want me alive, she realized. They're just trying to cripple me, not kill me yet. She sneered. They won't catch me.
A saucer dived down before her. Lailani fired her front cannons, blasting her way through.
There! She saw it ahead! The wormhole portal shimmered in space like a nebula.
Saucers moved to block the Ryujin's path.
Lailani screamed as she flew, switching all power to her cannons, leaving her engines dead.
Her ship was small but furious. Her volley slammed into the saucers ahead, knocking them off course.
Lailani diverted full power to her engines, even shutting down life support. She flew forward, barrel-rolling between several saucers. She scraped against their hulls. The Ryujin screamed in protest. Sparks flew. Her hull dented. Smoke filled the cabin.
She burst through.
Cracked, dented, leaking fire and smoke, the Ryujin plunged into the wormhole.
Lailani switched life support back on, raised her visor, and gulped air.
Lights shimmered around her. The small starship flew through the wormhole, moving at incredible speed through sparkling luminescence.
And behind her, the saucers followed.
Damn it! She had hoped they wouldn't fit. But this tunnel was wide, and at least a dozen of the bastards were now flying after her through the portal.
She traveled fifty light-years within moments.
She burst back out into open space.
She shoved down the throttle, roaring toward the next portal.
The Tree of Light had been built like a subway system, and there were many stations along the paths. Nobody knew who had built this ancient network; the alien architects had vanished long ago. Today many species used these highways, and as Lailani flew toward another porthole, she saw a variety of alien starships. Some looked like massive dragonflies, their wings formed of solar panels. Other starships were bulky cubes. Some were giant spheres of light, spinning madly, while some looked like terrariums, filled with alien plants. A few starships were more like aquariums, built for aquatic aliens. One ship looked like a feathery starfish. Some were giant; other starships were the size of shoe boxes.
Lailani didn't recognize these species. She had no time to pay close attention. She zipped between her fellow travelers, and the grays followed.
Three more wormhole openings hovered ahead. Each portal would lead to another location in the galaxy. Lailani chose the busiest portal, whizzing her way among the other starships waiting to enter. She would have to toss courtesy aside today and cut in line.
"Coming through, coming through!" she shouted, wishing she had a horn to honk.
Behind her, one of the pursuing saucers slammed into an alien starship.
The alien ship—a hulking metal machine, all sharp angles and jagged cannons—did not respond kindly. Soon the saucer and bulky aliens were exchanging fire.
Lailani dived into another wormhole.
She flew through the shimmering tunnel.
Behind her, several saucers still followed.
She burst out thirty light-years away and roared forth, heading toward another wormhole.
Again she flew through a tunnel of light. Again she zipped between alien starships, trying to shake pursuit, and chose another path.
At each intersection, she managed to stir some trouble. She was small and agile, able to whisk around the larger starships traveling the Tree of Light. Again a pursuing saucer crashed into an alien starship. Again a battle raged behind her, the enraged aliens blasting fire at the saucer that had crashed into them.
"That's me, Epi," Lailani said. "Instigator of galactic road rage. Now to finally lose those bastards."
As a battle raged behind her, as smoke and fire hid the Ryujin, she chose one of seven shimmering wormholes ahead. The battle, she dared to hope, would hide which path she chose.
She vanished into the tunnel, plunged through light, and emerged by a distant star system.
Nobody followed.
Finally she had shaken the pursuit.
She slumped back in her seat, breathing heavily, and rose to hover in the cockpit.
For long moments, as the Ryujin floated in space, Lailani merely floated in the cockpit, just breathing. Her pulse gradually slowed down. Against all odds, she was alive.
"Epi," she said, "we really need to install seat belts here. And some cannons on the back."
The Doberman licked her face in agreement.
She floated into the hold and checked on HOBBS. He was still alive, but barely. He was unconscious, his pulse slow. During the flight, he had banged against the walls, which couldn't have helped.
"Don't worry, Hobster," she said. "I'm going to find your maker. He'll fix you. You'll see. Just hang in there a little longer, buddy."
They flew onward, gliding from wormhole to wormhole, as HOBBS's heart struggled for each beat, as the starship leaked air, and as the saucers filled the galaxy with their evil.
CHAPTER FOUR
The Thunder Road flew through blue skies, gliding over the verdant lands of Durmia. The Volkswagen rattled, and the windshield was cracked, but Marco still found the view breathtaking.
"It's beautiful," he said softly. "It's one of the most beautiful places I've seen. I've never seen such—Addy!" He pushed her feet away. "God, feet away from my nose! They stink. And they're hiding my view."
"They do not stink, and they're not on your nose. They're on the dashboard." Addy leaned back, stretching out her legs. "It's not my fault that I'm so tall and have such long, lovely legs."
He groaned and wrestled with her feet for a moment, finally managing to remove them from the dashboard. "God, you must be fucking delightful on coach flights." He gazed back outside. "Now put down that stupid freak book and enjoy the view. We'll be landing soon, and it's our last chance to see the landscape from above."
"Don't call it my stupid freak book. That's offensive." Addy hugged the book to her chest. "It's Freaks of the Galaxy: Second Edition. A serious work of literature." She tapped her chin. "You know, Poet, maybe you'd sell more books if you wrote about freaks. People love freaks."
"Fine," Marco said. "My next book, I'll make you the main character."
"That's the spirit!" She frowned. "Hey."
Marco returned to the view, trying to enjoy it—and ignore the sound of Addy popping bubble gum and drumming on the dashboard. Hills rolled below, draped with forests. A river snaked across the land, silver in the sunlight. Golden mountains soared on the horizon. A pristine world, warm and lush.
Yet as they kept flying, his stomach curdled.
"Addy," he said.
She was flipping through her book. "Huh? Are we there yet?"
He frowned. "Addy. Addy!" He pulled her book down. "Look. Look below."
She leaned forward and peered down. She frowned. "Poet!" She turned toward him, face crinkled up. "You took us to the wrong planet!"
He slumped in his seat. "This is the right place, Ads. But we might be too late."
Below them spread ruins.
It had been a city once, eras ago. There was little left now. Most of the homes had fallen, were only scattered bits of walls like a shattered labyrinth. A fortress rose on a hill, two of its towers fallen on the hillside. A villa or perhaps a temple stood on another hill, its dome pockmarked and cracked. Colossal statues lay fallen, half-buried in the earth. Nature had been reclaiming the ruins. Weeds sprouted between the bricks. Trees grew along the streets and through broken roofs, their roots clutching the ruins like wooden fists. If any Durmians still lived here, they were well hidden. As
ide from the plants and several birdlike aliens, Marco saw no life, certainly no elephantine humanoids.
Marco looked back at Addy. "Ads, how old is your book?"
"Freaks of the Galaxy?"
"Not Freaks of the Galaxy! God!" He groaned. "The Way of Deep Being. The book by Baba Mahanisha. You know, the reason we're here?"
She shrugged. "I dunno. A year or two maybe?" She lifted the book. "There! Printed 2152. Just two years old."
Marco stared at her, slack-jawed. "Addy! That's the year it was printed. When was it written?"
She blinked at him. "Those are different dates?"
Marco let out the loudest, longest groan of his life. "Addy! For fuck's sake. Tell me this book isn't as ancient as the Bible, that we didn't come here seeking a guru who died when Confucius was a baby."
"Confy-who?"
He slapped his forehead. "God. God, Addy. Your guru must have died thousands of years ago! We came all this way for nothing. And we lost all our supplies when the grays attacked. We don't even have enough food or water to get us back to Earth."
She frowned. "I'm not going back to Earth. We came all this way to study from the guru."
He pointed at her. "You came all this way because you wanted to see an elephant with two trunks. I actually wanted to learn something spiritual. Instead I just find rubble."
Her cheeks flushed, and her eyes narrowed. "Hey, don't you point that finger at me. You're the author. You're the one who should know about book dates and stuff. You're the smart one, remember? I'm just the leggy, beautiful, brave, strong, funny, and famous one."
"You're the one with half a cookie stuck on her cheek," he muttered.
She gasped and plucked it off. "Mmm, face-cookie!" She tossed it into her mouth.
Marco wanted to scold her. To roll his eyes. To groan. Maybe even to yell. But when he looked at Addy, he couldn't stay mad.
She's hurt, he knew. Here is the woman who fought the scum in the mines of Corpus and the hives of Abaddon. The woman who survived captivity and torture on a marauder ship, who had raised Earth in rebellion. The woman who led hundreds of thousands in war, who fought alien tyrants, who saved the world. The woman I love. The love of my life. So let her be silly today. Let her eat her cookies, and put her feet on the dashboard, and be a girl again. Let her find some happiness after suffering so much pain.
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