Virgin (34 page)

“I must be more sensitive to its movement then,” Dax said. “I can hardly
wait
to get in the boat.”

“Actually, this thing is better than a boat on water,” Threldigan said, gesturing toward the
Juleta.
“Waves won’t affect it much—unless they’re really big ones.”

Dax directed a baleful glare at his old friend but saw no reason to back it up with a retort. Threldigan had been very helpful in preparing for the invasion of Aquerei, making lots of new “gadgets” during the voyage, only joining the others for meals, with the result that he had amassed quite a large bag of tricks. As usual, he was wearing his cape but seemed to have lost a bit of his devil-may-care attitude. Dax suspected he’d never been part of an invasion force before—and certainly not one that was so hopeless. Though they’d all armed themselves with every type of weapon the
Valorcry
had to offer, they were still immeasurably outgunned and outnumbered. This prospect had sobered all of them—even the two Kitnocks had ceased their knuckle-cracking conversations—except for Ava. She was grinning broadly as she gazed out across the open sea, fairly shivering with excitement.

“What a beautiful ocean!” she exclaimed. “I can’t wait to dive into it!”

Dax shuddered in revulsion. Standing chest deep near the shore on Rhylos had been one thing; diving headfirst into the fathomless sea was quite another. “You
are
going to ride in the boat, aren’t you?”

“What—oh, of course I will.” She seemed slightly distracted. “It’s probably too far to swim, anyway, isn’t it, Joss?”

Joss shrugged. “Depends on how quickly you want to get there. We’re about twenty-five clicks away from Mirolar to the south and Rhashdelfi to the north.” With a smug grin, he added, “Can you see why putting a base here would be profitable?”

“I’m sure you’ll make millions,” Dax said dryly.

“Oh, much more than that,” Joss assured him. His tentacles were tossing merrily in the ocean breeze, though Dax suspected that their happy dance had more to do with the prospect of monetary gain than the wind.

Ava was still gazing longingly at the sea, having ventured partway down the gentle slope that formed the shoreline of the base. Dax knew she could handle herself in the water, but, concerned for her safety, he moved in behind her anyway, ready to catch her if she slipped.

She smiled up at him as he approached and stepped back onto the level platform. “So, which way do we go and how far is a click?”

Dax pointed over her shoulder to the northwest. “That way, and a click is about two kilometers.”

“Fifty kilometers, then.” With a wistful sigh, she leaned back against him. “Farther than I want to swim, that’s for sure.”

Enfolding her in his arms, Dax leaned down to nuzzle her neck, noting that her scent reflected her disappointment. “Once the stones have done their thing, you can swim as much as you like.”

“Sounds fabulous.” She sighed. “I’ve never lived anywhere that I could swim as much as I liked.”

Dax felt her quiver of anticipation and understood how she must be feeling—the way he would feel if, by some miracle, Zetith had been recreated and he had just landed there. “Does it feel like home?”

“It does—though I’m sure this is the last place you’d ever want to live—but just look at it, Dax! Can you see how clear and clean it is? These waters must be teeming with life.” She gasped in awe as a large fish breached the surface. “What an absolutely perfect world…”

“It’s not perfect yet,” he reminded her. “It’s up to us to make it that way.”

Nodding, she raised his hand and pressed her lips to it, sending a thrill racing all the way to his toes. “You’re right. Let’s get this invasion started.”

The others had already boarded the
Juleta
. Kots was hovering nearby, mumbling as he held Luke’s leash. Dax and Ava both gave the puppy a hug, but he still whined his displeasure at being left behind.

“We’ll be back as soon as we can,” Dax told the little droid. “But if anyone tries to board, steal, or impound the ship, you know what to do.”

Kots chirped and headed back aboard the
Valorcry
with Luke trotting behind him.

“What’s he supposed to do?” Ava asked. “Self-destruct?”

“No,” Dax replied. “He’s supposed to lock the hatch and lift off.”

“He can fly that thing all by himself?”

Dax nodded. “He can’t do anything fancy, but he can get it off the ground.”

“Maybe he ought to do that now,” Ava suggested. “Might make it less obvious that we were ever here.”

“True, but I don’t think anyone tracked us here, and with a war going on, there’s not much interstellar traffic around this planet. I didn’t see any satellites in orbit, so they’d have to rely on line of sight. I don’t know about you, but I can’t see a damn thing.”

The
Juleta
was a large, oval-shaped craft with high railings on the sides and a row of passenger seats in the middle. As the others climbed aboard, Dax took the helm, which was located on the port side nearer to the stern than the bow. He was familiar with the controls, but navigation at sea required a different technique than traveling on land. He would have to rely on the instruments. Firing up the engine, he steered the
Juleta
toward the edge of the base and then out over the open water.

“Are there actual cities beneath the surface?” Teke asked.

“Yes,” Joss replied, “though there aren’t any near this base. The Opps would have fought the construction if there had been—and they haven’t been crazy about the bases as it is.”

“You keep calling them ‘Opps,’” Diokut said. “What does that mean?”

“The Opps are those who oppose unity, and the Unities are those who support it,” Joss explained. “As I’ve said before, there are two factions on land and two factions in the sea. It’s very confusing and nearly impossible to guess who you’re dealing with. And they all want the stone.”

“Do any of them actually work together?” Teke asked.

“You’d think they would, wouldn’t you? But they never have—at least, not that I’ve ever heard.”

“The funny thing is, out here, it looks so peaceful,” Waroun observed. “You’d never know there was a civil war going on.”

“You just
had
to say that, didn’t you?” Dax growled as he glanced at the navigation console.

“What? Why?”

“Because there are three ships heading right for us. Big ones.”

Ava looked worried. “Warships?”

“I can’t imagine they’d be friendly,” Joss said. “Someone must have seen us land after all.”

“That’s the trouble with the sea,” Quinn said. “They could be all around us, and we’d never know until it was too late.”

“It’s already too late!” Dax yelled as a grappling hook sailed over the starboard side, attaching itself to the railing with sharp pitons that bit deeply into the metal. Two more hooks followed the first. This was
not
good. “Try to cut them or throw them off!”

Waroun was the first to reach the hooks, but though he tried desperately to dislodge them, they wouldn’t budge. Teke had armed himself with a knife the size of a short sword and began using it to hack at the ropes, but whatever they were made of was tougher than the knife. Ava screamed as three Aquerei began to climb aboard. Dax knew she was tougher than that, and wasn’t a bit surprised to see that she’d already drawn her pulse pistol. Taking aim, she stunned one of them before Joss intervened.

“Hold your fire!” he shouted. “These are my men from the base.”

“How the hell can you tell?” Waroun snapped. “They all look the same to me.”

“Trust me, I can tell,” Joss yelled back.

“We saw you land,” one of the men gasped as he slid onto the deck, “but couldn’t reach you in time. We’ve been hiding in the depths for days. It’s bad, Joss. Really bad.”

Two more Aquerei swarmed over the side, dragging the one Ava had stunned along with them. Dax hoped there weren’t any more of them, for the
Juleta
only had seating for twelve, aside from the pilot. Any more than that would put them over the weight limit, and sinking would become a definite possibility.

Dax swore as three more scrambled up the ropes. The controls spiked as the
Juleta
tipped dangerously to starboard. “Some of you get over here on this side,” he bellowed. “We’re going to flip over if you don’t!”

The Kitnocks and the Drell were quick to follow orders. Ava pulled Waroun back from the side, and Joss and two of the men dragged the unconscious man to an open space behind the seats. The others clambered into seats, the water still sluicing from their streamlined bodies. Essentially nude except for their seaweed loincloths, they looked like the day’s catch spilling onto the deck of a fishing boat.

“What can you tell me about those ships up ahead?”

“They’re bound to be Opps,” a green-tentacled man replied. “They ran us off the base.” Turning to Joss, he went on, “They knew you were coming. They just weren’t sure when.”

“How the hell could they know that?” Waroun demanded. “And why would they think we would land here? We didn’t know that until just a little while ago ourselves.”

“But there were all those Aquerei on Rhylos,” Ava said. “They must have been tailing us the whole time. They saw us with Joss and did the math.”

“But why would they just follow us?” Waroun asked. “They could have stolen that rock from you anytime—or just killed us all.”

“Could be that you guys are more intimidating than you realize—remember when the Cylopean tried it?” Ava shrugged. “Who knows? I mean, if we can’t tell which side anyone is on, maybe they can’t either.”

If Joss’s bleak expression was any indication, that was probably true. Dax was playing scenarios through his head. Surrender to the approaching ships, hand over the stone and go home, evade them and thus add even more distance to their journey, or pretend to be on their side—whichever side it was—or stand and fight a hopeless battle and probably all be killed. Then there was the other option: He hadn’t brought along a magician for nothing.

“Hey, Threld, what have you got?”

“Decoy drones,” Threldigan replied. “But—”

Waroun rolled his eyes. “What the devil is a decoy drone?”

“They make duplicate images of an original.”

This sounded interesting. “Can they float?”

“Never tried using them on water,” Threldigan replied.

“No time like the present,” said Dax. “Toss one out.”

Threldigan reached into his bag and pulled out a small shiny cube. “The only problem is that it won’t keep up with us as we move forward.”

“Then maybe we should stay put.” Dax cut back the throttle, and the
Juleta
slowed to a crawl, the repulsors keeping them hovering just above the water. “Good thing the sea is calm today.” The thought of huge waves swallowing them up didn’t set well with him at all.

“So, Threldy,” Waroun began. “Just how do these things work?”

Dax chuckled to himself, knowing that Threldigan would never tell, and Waroun should have known better than to ask.

Threldigan gave him a crooked smile. “Magic.” With that, he threw the cube overboard.

Thankfully, it didn’t sink, but bobbed lightly on the surface. As they watched, a mirror image of the
Juleta
and its passengers began to unfold from the cube.

“Ha!” Waroun shouted. “We’ll look like an entire fleet! How many have you got?”

“Twelve,” Threldigan replied. “But we might not need them all—just enough to confuse them.” He tossed out four more and, suddenly, there were five
Juletas
.

“Now all we need is something that looks like a really big gun,” Waroun said gleefully. “And we’ll be all set!”

“Give me your pulse rifle,” Threldigan said. “And don’t worry, I’ll give it back.”

Waroun did as he asked, but Dax could tell he wasn’t very happy about it; Waroun was quite fond of that rifle, having won it from a nasty Udwend in a game of
kartoosk
.

Threld set the rifle on the railing at the bow and put a small round sticker on it. Instantly, the rifle grew to ten times its original size, as did those on the decoy drones. “Illusion dot,” Threldigan said. “And no, I’m not going to tell you how it works.”

“So, now we’re a fleet of six with really big guns. I like this,” said Joss. “At least we
look
intimidating.”

Dax gazed ahead at the approaching ships and consulted his instruments. They were definitely slowing.

Everyone seemed more confident, until Joss threw in one more comment. “Of course, if they have any of those disruptor weapons that can destroy a base, we’re doomed, but maybe they don’t have them on every ship.”

“What are you talking about?” the green-tentacled man gasped. “A weapon that can destroy a base? That’s impossible!” The other Aquerei men all seconded his statement, their tentacles snapping with indignation.