“Thank you, Doctor,” Ruxbane said. “Let’s address the requisitions while I wait.”
“Absolutely, sir, come this way.”
Chapter 21
Rumbling walls shook Tayel awake. Her heart raced as she scanned the hold, eyes darting from one empty corner to the next. Shy’s ship. She was on Shy’s ship. Her breathing steadied. The white light outside the viewport peeled away to reveal the inky blackness of space, and she spread her fingers along the floor to steady herself while the shaking subsided. The normal, quiet hum of the engines resumed.
Shy’s voice crackled through the speakers, “We’re here. You all better come up front.”
Tayel rubbed her eyes with the heels of her palms. She couldn’t have been asleep long. Despite the adrenaline rush on waking, her muscles lagged in movement as she pushed to a stand. Her feet seemed to move one second past when she meant them to. Her thoughts were a swirl of fog. She blinked at the forward corridor to the cockpit, an empty ache at the front of her mind like she’d forgotten something.
Right. Jace. She had to get Jace.
She trudged down the short hall to the bedrooms, and stopped at his door. She knocked lightly. “Jace?”
“Come in,” he called, his voice muffled by the steel.
Tayel pressed her hand to the green pad beside the doorway and the metal slid aside.
“Hey,” he grumbled. He swung his legs over the cot, his head feathers pressed flat to one side.
The unkempt feathers and tired look in his eyes reminded her of sleepovers on school nights, the ones that, after a while, Mom had stopped fighting them over. She’d said they could stay up as late as they want, if they got their buns up the next morning to go to class. Tayel smiled. Jace had always resented how late she could stay up watching Xander and Zero flicks.
“I can’t believe we’re already here,” Jace said.
“I thought of all people, you’d be the one to know how long the trip would take. Well, you and Shy, I guess.”
He scratched his eye ridge with his free talon. “Sure didn’t feel like four hours. Felt like four minutes.”
“Heh. I’m tired, too. There’s got to be somewhere to sleep where we’re going, though.”
Or so she hoped. She didn’t know anything about what they would face on Modnik, or if there would even be time to sleep. All she knew was that Jace’s family could be there, wherever the Delta shuttle landed. She nodded to herself. She was so close.
The door to the other room opened behind her. Fehn gripped the doorway, stretching his chest outward. He sighed as something popped.
“Morning,” he grumbled.
“Or evening,” Jace said, stepping into the hall. “Depending on where we land.”
“Ah, of course.” Fehn shook his head. “It is good to have you back, Feathers. I missed our resident know-it-all.”
“And I missed watching you brood.”
Tayel grinned at Jace’s happy clucking and Fehn’s sigh. For everything that had happened the night before, they weren’t falling apart yet. The miracles even four hours of sleep could do.
“Come on, guys,” she said. “We should probably go to the cockpit. Else Shy is going to think we’re still sleeping.”
Fehn motioned for her to lead the way. “What? Think she’d go on without us?”
“She’d probably be faster without us.”
He rubbed the back of his head. “Let’s not let her know we know that.”
Tayel walked across the hold and into the front corridor, winding one short bend before coming into view of the cockpit. The enormous viewport at the front of the piloting console showed a view of the planet below. Almost entirely white save for some swirls of blue, the small ice planet looked a lot like a marble Tayel might have found in Otto’s shop. Her jaw fell open, but her heart fluttered with pride. The Rokkir may have chased her from home, but fighting to get to Modnik had been her choice.
“There you all are,” Shy said.
Tayel squeezed into the cramped space behind the co-pilot’s chair to make room for Fehn and Jace.
“So what’s the plan?” Fehn asked.
“We have to find my brother. If he’s here.” Shy disengaged the auto-pilot and took hold of the yoke.
“What about the Delta shuttle?” Tayel asked.
“Don’t worry. Assuming it made it here at all, my brother will likely know where it is. It’s a good bet, at least. Better than wandering aimlessly in the snow.”
“Makes sense,” Jace said.
Tayel gripped the back of the co-pilot’s chair as the floor angled with the ship’s descent. If Jace’s parents were here, he could finally be safe. They could bunker down somewhere — maybe fly to the core systems to escape the war. Once they were reunited, though, would she want to stay with him? After everything she’d seen, she didn’t know if she could sit idly by and wait for Shy and her brother to stop the Rokkir.
“We’re going to break atmo,” Shy said. “There are harnesses in the hold if you need them, but the ride should be relatively smooth.”
No one left the cockpit. Shy steered through the atmosphere, forcing Tayel to plant her feet for stability. The risk of falling over was worth it for the view. Monotone white became complex and textured as they descended. Mountain ranges, frozen lakes, and pine forests covered the ground between expansive valleys of snow.
“Wow. How are you going to find your brother in all this?” Jace asked.
“His contact lives in Kalanie Outpost. It’s where we’ll start our search, and with any luck it’s where we’ll end it.” Shy pushed a button, and a glowing blue holographic map of Modnik appeared above the console. A red dot appeared on the globe.
Jace leaned in past the gap between two chairs to squint at it. “That’s a comprehensive globe. There are even resource markers on here.”
“My ship’s system has a detailed planetary and mining map for all planets in Igador.” The map disappeared, but coordinates remained on the dashboard.
“But the Varg are very reclusive. They wouldn’t just give away maps of their entire planet, right?”
Shy smirked.
The ship passed over a forest. Tayel put her hand over her mouth. A town crumbled in the valley below, orange flames licking at the last of the buildings. Raiders in typical Sinosian gear stood beyond the reach of the fire, staring back at their destruction. The soot-filled remains had probably housed hundreds of Varg, but nothing signaled survivors.
“It’s awful,” Jace said.
“Let’s hope it’s not too late to find your brother,” Fehn said.
Tayel picked at the gauze around her burn, unable to imagine the anguish and pain from a death by fire. Not like Mom. Falling wasn’t so bad, in comparison. With all the horrors the Rokkir were committing, maybe it was good she died so quickly.
Jace shook his head. “I don’t understand.”
“What?” Shy asked.
“If the Rokkir are the ones doing this — killing people here and even back on Delta, why are they keeping the refugees alive on Elsha?”
“For military recruits. You saw what they did to those refugees. They’ll turn them all into mindless slaves eventually.”
“Looks like they already have plenty of forces to me,” Fehn said. “If they can do this.”
They passed the view of the fire as the ship accelerated toward a distant forest. The black sky above was filled with stars.
“They have the whole Igador government on lockdown, too,” Tayel said. “From the Council to, xite, the raiders. What more do they really need to take over?”