I lean forward and rest my forehead on the heels of my hands. “Look, it’s not like the fact that we’re trying the diplomatic route means that we don’t have the option to go fire-and-fury later, but if we start shooting now, that’s it. No going back from that. Let Speaker do what he can. If nothing else, it buys us time.”
Lucas barks out a harsh laugh. “Time? Time for what, Mickey? Squatting in this B.O.-smelling can waiting to find out if Wormy can convince those things to just kill us instead of eating us alive? If we’re gonna do this, I’d just as soon do it now. There’s no cavalry to come for us, and the only thing waiting’s doing as far as I can see is giving them time to bring in more reinforcements.”
I look up. He’s staring at me, one hand resting on his accelerator. “If I thought we could shoot our way out of this,” I say, slowly and clearly, “I’d do it, Lucas. There are at least a hundred spiders out there, and we can kill a max of three per second. I don’t know how many ways I can say this: the math does not work.”
“The math doesn’t work if we believe that they’ll just keep coming once their friends start exploding,” Nasha says. “I’m not sure I buy that, though. I’m betting that once the shrapnel starts piling up, the rest of them cut and run.”
“I like the way Adjaya’s thinking,” Lucas says. “Get us up top, gun the engines, and see if they can catch us while they’re tripping over their friends’ bodies.”
“I hear you,” I say. “If what Speaker says about their concern for casualties is true, though, you’re totally wrong. You heard him say they’d be more than willing to let us take down half of them or more to get a shot at the rover, right? Are you willing to bet all of our lives on the idea that you understand those things’ psychology better than Speaker does?”
“It’s not about understanding,” Lucas says. “It’s about trust, and I trust Wormy about as far as I could throw him.”
“Be that as it may, I’m not going to risk our survival—and the colony’s, remember—on the idea that we can shoot our way out of this. Not yet, anyway. If Marshall had given us the firepower that we asked for, it might be a different story. As it stands, though, I still think Speaker is our best bet.”
“I guess we’ll see,” Lucas says. “Don’t get me wrong—I hope you’re right, Mickey. I’ve got a bad feeling, though. There’s stuff Wormy’s not telling us.” He settles deeper into the bench and tucks his chin to his chest. “Hope it doesn’t wind up getting us all killed, huh?”
ANOTHER HOUR PASSES before the hatch swings open and Speaker scuttles in.
“I have good news,” he says as it slams shut behind him. “We have agreed to a compromise.”
I glance around the cabin. Everyone is looking at me, not Speaker.
“Okay,” I say. “What do they want?”
He hesitates, and I feel my stomach clench.
“Well,” he says. “As we anticipated, they require us to surrender the rover. From their perspective, the metal in this machine is priceless.”
“I bet,” Lucas says. “Tell you what, though. Unless they know a lot more than you’d think about plasma physics, they’re about to get a big surprise when they cut into the power system.”
“What else do they want?” Nasha asks.
Speaker rises up to face her, but doesn’t speak.
“What is it?” Nasha says. “We knew they wanted the rover. If that was all they wanted, you would have just said so.”
“Yes,” Speaker says. “Well.”
She folds her arms across her chest. “Well?”
“In consideration of the one you destroyed, they require that you provide them an ancillary.”
014
“JAMIE?” NASHA SAYS. “Fire up the burner and get ready to roll.”
“No!” I say. “Wait! Just … just wait. I need to think.”
Lucas is wide awake now, on his feet and reaching for his weapon. “Think, Mickey? What are you thinking about? Which one of us you’re gonna hand over to those monsters? ’Cause I’ll tell you right now—it’s not gonna be me.”
Cat’s up too now, accelerator in hand and pulling her rebreather down over her face. “I’m with Lucas,” she says. “Time to go down swinging.”
“Please,” Speaker says. “Please consider, friends. This is not the time for rash actions. It is better to lose one than all, no?”
“Fair enough to say that we don’t understand their psychology,” Nasha says. “They sure as shit don’t understand ours.” She pulls her burners from their holsters and hands them to me. “Here. Not sure if these will help out there, but they probably won’t hurt. Jamie—how long until you’re ready to open up?”
A moment of silence follows. Then, for the first time since we picked up Speaker, the cockpit door slides back into its recess, and Jamie ducks through and into the cabin.
“No,” he says. “Speaker is right. So is Mickey. Those things are all around us. If you go out there and start shooting, they’ll be on top of the rover and tearing you apart before we’ve gone twenty meters. I could try with the burner, but I can’t target them with that if they’re crawling over our skin. The time to fight was when we were moving and they were spread out. It’s too late now.”
Nasha stares at him, her jaw hanging open, for a long five seconds. It’s Lucas who finally breaks the silence.
“Okay, rabbit man. What do you suggest, then? How do you plan on picking one of us to feed to the spiders? Because, just to reiterate, it’s goddamn well not gonna be me.”
Jamie closes his eyes. When he opens them again, his face has taken on a hard, angry set.
“No,” he says. “It’s not gonna be you, Lucas. You’re muscle, and we need muscle. Same goes for Chen, right? And it can’t be Mickey, can it? He’s our creeper whisperer. Nasha? She’s a fighter too, and Mickey would never let her go anyway. So, who does that leave, dumbass?” He looks at us each in turn, then shakes his head. “Don’t look at me like that, you assholes. And if you make it back to the dome somehow, don’t you fucking dare tell anybody that I volunteered for this. I am not fucking volunteering, understand? I’m just recognizing reality. I got pushed into this fiasco because I’m rated to pilot the rover. That’s my function here. If we’re giving up the rover, then what am I? Dead weight.” He laughs. “Dead weight. Dead meat. Same thing.” He turns to Speaker. “Should I take a rebreather, or will they just tear me to pieces as soon as I step through the hatch?”
“I cannot advise you on this,” Speaker says. “They demanded an ancillary. They gave me no indication of what they intended to do with it.”
“It?” Lucas says. “Fuck you, Wormy.”
“Jamie,” Nasha says. “You don’t have to do this. We can just go—just roll over them. We don’t even know these things are capable of breaching our armor.”
“They are,” Speaker says. “After engaging with them, I can confirm this.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Cat says. “Nasha’s right. This isn’t happening. We don’t do human sacrifices.”
“They do not request a sacrifice,” Speaker says. “They request an ancillary. Please recall that you are the strangers here. This is customary for us.”
“We don’t give a shit what’s customary for you,” Nasha says.
“If you fight,” Speaker says, “they will kill you all.”
“Just so you know,” Lucas says, “if we go down, you’re going with us, Wormy. You’re not squirming away. I’ll put the round in you myself if it comes to that.”
“No,” Speaker says, “that will not be necessary. I told them that I could bargain in your place. If you try to fight them now, they will see this as a betrayal on my part. They will certainly disassemble me along with you, and they may attach the guilt for my deception to my nest. Please consider that what you do here may be the beginning of a broader war.”