by Erica Rue
“Yup.” Bel offered no additional information. “That’s why I don’t want you to tell Oberon.”
“Interesting.” It was the nicest thing he could think to say. After spending time with Dione, he was beginning to doubt how smart she actually was. Or maybe Lithia’s impulsiveness was rubbing off on her. Dione had been growing on him, but her selfishness—running off to the island without a thought of how it would affect the rest of them—had stopped that. Either way, Zane had nothing nice to say at the moment, and Bel didn’t like it when he shared how he really felt, so he was glad she changed the subject.
“Any news on the translation of the datacore?” she asked.
“Nearly complete.”
“Have you checked my hypothesis? Do the Vens have a predator?”
“No. Until the datacore is completely translated, I can’t really do that.”
“What do you mean?” Bel asked.
“The program translates in passes rather than going straight through. It’s kind of like an antique printer. Instead of printing the whole image, it lays down all the cyan ink first, then magenta, yellow, and finally black. If you’re missing a layer, the image won’t look right. Same with the program. Afterward, it tries to smooth out the translation, like an artist adding highlights and shadows. We could look at what she has now, but it wouldn’t be very readable.”
“Well, I wouldn’t presume to look at your masterpiece before it’s ready,” Bel teased. He could hear the smile in her voice, and that made him miss her even more.
“She’ll be finished once you’re back, and we can look at it together.”
Bel laughed. “You know what, Zane?”
“What?” he asked, pushing his food with his fork.
“No one has asked what the Vens are up to. They escaped. Are they going to live in the forest now? Take up residence in the Forest Temple?”
“I don’t think the ragtag group you’ve described to me should go hunting them down,” he said.
“I agree. The Vens killed the Green Cloaks at the farm we were investigating before we arrived.”
“Aren’t the Aratians taking precautions?” Zane asked.
“They’ve got guards, but the Ficarans wouldn’t leave them any guns,” Bel replied.
“Victoria keeps going on about how the Aratians stole them. She’s in a bad mood. Keeps threatening Benjamin.”
“Well, we found the guns, so that crisis should be averted. She was sort of right. The Green Cloaks had them here.”
Zane furrowed his brow. “What were they planning?”
“Nothing good. But now I’m more worried about the Vens. Why come all the way out here if they were just going to attack the Aratians again? I looked at the maps, and this farm is in between the Vale Temple and the Marauder.”
Zane pushed his plate away and pulled up a map. He shook his head. “That’s technically true, but it’s not the most efficient route. Why would they swing so wide?”
“Maybe killing their comms has interfered with their sense of direction, too,” Bel offered.
Zane pursed his lips. He didn’t think that was right. There was a much more direct path for them to return to the Marauder. “What if they’re regrouping before another attack on the Aratians?”
“We shouldn’t underestimate their desire to kill us. Can Sam track them?”
“Not a chance,” he said. “Integrating the Calypso’s hardware into the base is going smoothly so far, but Sam is taxed. The translation’s almost done, but even if I stopped that, she’d have to do a lot of communicating with the space station and run a lot of simulations with the data. Basically, it would be a mess.”
“I see your point.” Bel sighed. “I know you wanted to wait for me, but this is too strange. See what you can find out from the translation, even if it’s a blurry image. It might give us some hints on what they’re up to. Alliance intel hasn’t been as accurate as I would have hoped.”
“I already explained, the translation isn’t complete,” Zane said.
“There has to be something to look at, even if it isn’t pretty.”
“This isn’t going to be fun,” he warned her.
“I never thought it would be,” she replied.
***
Zane and Oberon had spent the better part of the previous night and the morning working on migrating the Calypso’s heart and soul over to the Mountain Base.
Oberon put a hand on Zane’s shoulder after they made the final adjustments, just in time for a late lunch. “Thank you, Zane. You were right about the Calypso. She never would have flown again. At least this way, she’ll get to do some good.”
Zane gave him a sad smile. “I know what it’s like to love a ship. I really meant it when I said it was like an organ transplant. She’ll live on in this base and do a lot of good.”
“Thank you, professor,” Sam chimed in. “It makes it easier to say goodbye, knowing that the Icon will remain functional.”
Though Zane was tired, there was a new task on the docket.
“Oberon,” he said. “I was talking to Bel, and she wants to know what the Vens are planning. They attacked the Green Cloak hideout.”
Oberon stroked the short beard that was growing on his chin. “I would have thought they’d attack the Vale Temple again, but with their communications disrupted, they might have a different directive.”
“Bel thinks the Alliance intel is misleading,” Zane replied. “She thinks we might be able to find something in the datacore. The translation is still rough, but we might get lucky.”
Oberon’s expression grew dark. “She’s probably right. Things haven’t been adding up. I’ll make sandwiches and brew us some coffee. Download what we’ve got so far on some tablets and meet me in the common area.”
Zane did as he was told. Tired as he was from the long hours they’d put in, he was ready to look into what they had found. He wasn’t like Dione. He didn’t trust the Alliance to share important information with the masses. He knew what power did to most people, and it seemed to him that the people who sought power were often the ones who didn’t deserve it.
Like he’d predicted, most of it was gibberish—bad translations that didn’t make much sense. He was one and a half cups in to the pot of coffee when he found something. A list of conditions. If this, then that. They looked like contingency plans, or recommendations for how the Vens should react to certain conditions. “Oberon, take a look at this.”
They didn’t have the entire list, but it looked endless. “This explains when they can use their armor and weapons,” Zane said. “They didn’t use armor at the Field Temple—probably because there was such a small number of Ficarans, based on what I’m reading.”
“What’s the point of all this?” Oberon wondered aloud, skimming the list. “Why preset these conditions rather than let commanders make their own choices?”
“Maybe the Ven commanders aren’t the ones calling the shots,” Zane said. He knew what it felt like to be micromanaged, but this was an extreme.
“What conditions cause them to retreat, like they did at the battle for the Vale Temple?”
They both perused the list, but Zane figured it out first.
“If long-range communications get disrupted, they prioritize reestablishing communications over anything else. That allows them to transmit combat data back to the citadel ships.” He looked up at the professor. “This must mean they’re heading back to the Marauder.”
Unlike the Invader, which Sam had blown up with the Icon, the Marauder was still in one piece, out in the field where the Vens had landed it. Brian and Dione had disabled its transmissions array. Zane was still bothered by the knowledge that the Vens hadn’t gone straight there. What had they been doing in the meantime?
Oberon was already making plans. “Victoria’s got some people at the Marauder, but they’re techs, mostly. Enough fire power to fend off Aratians, but I’m not sure about Vens.” The pair looked at each other, at once giddy from their discovery and terr
ified by its implications. The general consensus had been that the Vens would try attacking the Aratians again. Now, that seemed extremely unlikely.
“How long do we have?” Zane asked. “What do we do?”
“Warn the Ficarans and the Aratians. Tell Victoria to send reinforcements to the Marauder.”
“She’ll never believe us. She’ll think it’s some ploy for us to get a shuttle.”
“I know, but we’ve got to try. She remembers what happened the last time she didn’t heed our warnings about the Vens.”
“I can assist.” It was Sam. “I’ll tell her that I’ve detected Vens approaching, but she’ll need to send out scouts in Flyers, as well as reinforcements.”
“But you can’t do that kind of surveillance right now,” Zane protested.
“She doesn’t know that,” Sam replied.
Zane smiled. He was glad Sam was on his side now. He would miss her when she was gone.
***
When Zane reached the top of the stairs, he glimpsed a tall woman with dark brown hair in a high ponytail walking in the opposite direction.
“Victoria!” he shouted, jogging after her. She stopped long enough to turn, make eye contact, and continue walking. “Wait!”
“Like I told your professor, I’m not going to lend you a Flyer,” she said.
“That’s fine, Dione and Brian are idiots, anyway,” he said. “We’ve got a real problem. The Vens.”
Her mood shifted in a moment. She beckoned him into a room off the hall and closed the door. “Who told you?” Her voice was low and the down-turned corners of her mouth twitched. Up close he could clearly see the dark circles under her eyes.
“Told me what?” Zane asked.
Her eyes widened, and she stepped back, now angry she had given something away. Zane thought it was best to continue before she said anything else. “We were reading up on the Vens and discovered that they’re going to attack the Marauder to reestablish communications.”
Victoria frowned at him. “Your information is wrong.”
Zane hesitated. He had pulled the info prematurely, but this wasn’t a translation error or a misunderstanding. The simple language of the list he’d found had probably made it more translatable than some of the gibberish he and the professor had skipped over.
Then it hit him. “You know where the Vens are. You’ve gotten word. Not from Colm. Bel would have mentioned it. Not from your people at the Marauder, or you’d believe me.” It took him a second to piece things together, but he figured it out before Victoria could leave the room. “They’re at the Field Temple, aren’t they? I know you sent teams to scavenge the settlement.”
She pursed her lips, but nodded. “You might be the only clever one in your group. The Vens came back to the Field Temple. One of the teams stopped checking in, and I’ve withdrawn the others until we can send a group that is prepared to take them on.”
Zane had no idea what the Vens were doing at the Field Temple, but he knew where they were headed next.
“Trust me, the Field Temple is just a pit stop. They’re headed for the Marauder. They can’t be allowed to reestablish communications.”
Victoria peered at him, clearly skeptical. Finally, she nodded. “I’ll send support to the Marauder.”
“Call the Aratians, too. You’ll need all the help you can get. All of Kepos is at stake.”
She paused in the doorway before leaving him alone in the room. Zane wasn’t sure if he had gotten through to her. He might have to make his own calls.
26. CORA
Cora finally felt like she had a moment to relax. Her uncle knew to be on the lookout for a Green Cloak rebellion, and they would be heading home soon. She felt confident that they would learn something useful from Asher. She wouldn’t become Regnator. She had proof that the Farmer was a liar. Jameson. Call him Jameson. Names had power, after all.
Cora had shown Lithia the images of the original colonists, including their grandmother, Miranda Min. “What do you think people will do when we show them?”
Lithia scoffed. “Freak out. But that’s normal. I think after the Vens, people will be receptive at least. They’re looking for answers.”
“If we don’t have a Regnator, though, what do we do?” Cora asked.
“You can still have a Regnator. Maybe have an election? Draw names out of a hat? I’m not the best person to ask. There are a lot of options.”
Cora opened her mouth to ask more questions, but the girl running toward them gave her pause.
“Lithia!” Bel was shouting. “Lithia! Oberon called.”
“What’s happened? Did he fix the Calypso?”
Cora could tell from Bel’s expression that the news was grim.
“The Vens are approaching the Marauder. He needs our help. Cora, Oberon is requesting maximute support,” Bel said.
“My uncle is still in charge, not me.”
“He couldn’t reach your uncle.”
“That’s strange,” Cora said. She tried calling Benjamin, but there was no answer. She called Moira, who had been in her lab all day and hadn’t seen him. She tried one of his aides, but they said her uncle was busy.
“Whoever Oberon talked to refused to let the Flyers land in the settlement,” Bel said.
“Some alliance you’ve got there,” Lithia muttered.
“I’ll go,” Cora said. “We have a few maximutes. Theo, will you and your men join us? It will take us some time to ride there. How long do we have?”
“I’m with you,” Theo said. “I doubt the others will hesitate.”
Bel nodded and stepped to the side to call Oberon and update him.
Theo put a hand on Cora’s shoulder. “These others, though…” He gestured to the people who had come with them. Most were talking among themselves, looking a little scared.
“Does anyone want to join us?” Cora asked the group. “You’re under no obligation to come.”
Jai and Amber readily agreed, but the others had seen enough. “I’m sorry, Cora,” said one of the girls. “We just can’t. I thought we could help, but that was against Green Cloaks, not the Vens.”
Cora gave her an understanding smile. “No one can fault you for that. Thank you for your support.”
“Riding will take too long,” Bel interjected. “Victoria’s sending five Flyers, one for each maximute and rider, and whoever else can fit.”
Cora looked around.
“So what happens to us? It’s not safe to be out here.” It was Gavin. He sounded angry. “Is your uncle sending a Flyer for us?”
“If you’re so worried about safety, I wonder why you volunteered for a potentially dangerous expedition. As for my uncle, I haven’t been able to reach him,” Cora said. Repeating the fact set her stomach roiling.
“He picked a bad time to lock himself in his lab, then,” Gavin replied.
Cora relaxed a little, despite the barb at her uncle. That certainly sounded like him.
“I’ll ask Moira to go find him,” she replied.
“I can take care of that. I have some friends in the labs, too.”
Cora frowned at the spy. “Go ahead, then.” He was up to something, but she didn’t have time to figure out what. She needed to speak with Theo, coordinate the Ficaran pickups, and learn as much as possible about what was happening at the Ven ship.
“Theo, can one of your men return with the machi on his own? Maybe Taylor and Lena can help? Colm can ride his maximute, if that’s all right.” If Gavin did get the Flyer to pick them up, they would be leaving their machi behind. A single Flyer was not large enough to transport the rest of their group and their machi. A maximute and a couple of passengers would be a tight fit when the Ficaran Flyers came for them.
“Shouldn’t be a problem. Machi are far easier to corral than humans.” He gave her a grim smile. Taylor and Lena nodded in agreement.
Gavin approached her and spoke again. “I can take custody of the prisoner, too. No need to drag a liability into a fight with the Vens.
”
“No,” she said. “He stays with me.”
Gavin pursed his lips, but didn’t argue the point further. She didn’t trust him, but she supposed there couldn’t be much harm in letting him catch a Flyer here. With only two of Theo’s men remaining, she had to admit she would feel better if their Flyer retrieved everyone and took them to safety.
The Green Cloaks had murdered her father, and now several of them were dead. The rest would be taken care of when she returned home. She returned to her volunteers, her stomach in knots. She would have to face the Vens again, hopefully for the last time. The Vens had killed Will, but they had run. They were not omnipotent demons. Like all creatures, they had weaknesses. Like all creatures, they could be killed.
27. LITHIA
Lithia’s head was swimming.
Distracting herself had worked too well. She’d been focused on helping Cora and rescuing Dione, and she hadn’t bothered trying to anticipate where the Vens might go. She was so used to defense when it came to the Vens that offense hadn’t crossed her mind.
Now here they were, on defense again.
She and Bel did not have maximutes. They did, however, have the guns they’d found. Since they were heading to help the Ficarans anyway, she figured it couldn’t hurt to use them once they got there. Victoria would be happy to know that the missing weapons had been recovered, and she could have them after the battle.
When they won.
Much to Lithia’s surprise, Gavin had pulled it off. The Aratian Flyer arrived first. Those who had chosen not to face the Vens again filed on board, but Gavin approached Cora for one more argument.
“Are you sure about taking Asher?” he asked.
“Yes, he’ll stay with us for now,” Cora replied.
“You would take him to the fight with his hands bound?”
“Relax,” Lithia said. “He can stay in the Flyer. I don’t want this Ven-loving Green Cloak jerk getting anywhere near them.”
“Elijah will hear about this!”
Lithia rolled her eyes. “We know. That was the whole point of you joining us, wasn’t it? I’m sure you’ve been telling Elijah our every move.”
