“Ouch,” Arturo said. He was squished in the cargo space behind my seat in the cockpit, his head pressed against the roof. “This is not ideal.”
“Better than being taken by the Superiority,” I said.
“Taken!” Naga said from the side of my seat.
Chubs sat on my dash, looking at us curiously.
“Think you can return me to my ship?” Arturo asked.
I gave Naga a clear picture of Arturo’s cockpit. His ship had drifted away a bit, but I could still see it through my canopy, floating off to the side. Arturo and Naga disappeared, and a moment later the ship started flying toward mine. Chubs settled on my lap.
“Are you okay?” Arturo asked.
“I’m fine,” I said. “How’s your hand?”
“It’s all right, though I think my ego is bruised. Nedd always said we ought to have more training in hand-to-hand combat. I guess he was right.”
“It did the job,” I said. “Superiority operatives apparently really don’t like it when you punch them. I still have no idea how he managed to look like Rinakin.” I still had the bracelet in my hand, and I set it on the floor next to my seat to be examined later.
“About that,” Arturo said. “Spensa had a ship she found on Detritus. It had holographic technology that let her pretend to be you.”
I remembered FM and Jorgen saying something about that. “And the Superiority stole it?”
“I think they must have gotten their hands on her ship. They already knew she’d been using a hologram to look like you, so they would have been searching for it intentionally.”
That was a terrifying thought. Though it was also startling to learn that Spensa had technology even the Superiority didn’t know about. They always seemed like they knew everything.
“Poor M-Bot,” Arturo said. “I’m kind of surprised he didn’t self-destruct or something. Spensa is going to be pissed.”
“She’s not the only one,” I said.
“I’m checking on the others over the radio,” Arturo said. “Scud, their situation sounds hot.”
It would be. We’d sent all the cytonics Unity had to offer right at them. I hadn’t heard from Jorgen. He said it was easier for him to contact me when I was near, but I hoped he could manage it even across the distance. I reached out to him now—the Unity cytonics had reached them, but they hadn’t managed to get the field up.
Status report? I asked him.
We’re holding out, Jorgen said. We’ve kept the cytonics out of position so far, so they haven’t been able to get up their inhibitors or that concussion thing. They’re too busy not getting shot down. Did you find Rinakin?
Working on it.
Jorgen fell silent, probably fully occupied dealing with Quilan and his people.
“We have to hurry and find Rinakin,” I said. “If they just left to take him to the Superiority, he could still be in transport. Let me see if I can find their ship.”
I closed my eyes, reaching across the miasma around the tree. It was easier to find a huge field of cytonic inhibition rather than one ship across the whole of the planet.
“Angel?” Arturo said. “We have incoming.”
I opened my eyes and scanned my proximity sensors. He was right. A contingent of ships was headed right for us. Either they’d scanned and found us, or Quilan had reported our whereabouts.
I needed to focus on finding the ship holding Rinakin. “You want to take point on this one?”
“Gladly,” Arturo said. “Evasive maneuvers.”
“Copy,” I said, mirroring Arturo’s movements as he cut a path away from the incoming ships. I tried to focus on the negative realm, reaching out with my senses, canvassing the area for dead spots.
There. Above the reaching branches of the tree, kilometers up in the miasma, was a tiny spot I couldn’t feel, like a dead nerve on an otherwise healthy patch of skin.
“Found it,” I said to Arturo. “Closer to the tree and up.”
“You want to take the lead now?” Arturo asked.
“Yes.” I accelerated and shot out in front of him, veering sharply upward so fast that my gravitational capacitors engaged, taking the brunt of the g-forces. The incoming ships changed course a moment later, following and gaining on us.
“I don’t know what kind of maneuvers you’re used to,” Arturo said. “And I’m sure we call them different things. So I’ll follow you and we’ll try not to get shot, okay?”