TASIA TAMBLYN
The emergency alarms in the Voracious Curiosity’s cockpit didn’t matter, and Tasia didn’t care about the red lines as she hauled ass away from the Iswander extraction yards. The ship had been damaged, and Tasia lost a lot of maneuverability, but she ran anyway—full speed, evasive maneuvers, high acceleration, abrupt and impossible course changes. She used every trick she had learned during the Elemental War.
Even when they were far from the bloater cluster, she kept going. If she stopped for a minute to make emergency repairs, the Curiosity would be wiped out in no time. Elisa Enturi didn’t seem to be in the mood for discussion.
When Tasia finally managed to activate the Ildiran stardrive, the sudden acceleration slammed them back with enough force to pull skin tight against muscles and press down on bones like a giant invisible foot. DD tumbled sideways and skittered across the deck. Orli Covitz let out an involuntary grunt of pain and fear. Robb couldn’t breathe, but Tasia did not relent.
“Come on!” she said through gritted teeth.
The cockpit alarms reached a crescendo. Several secondary systems finally gave up, and the screens went dark. Gambling, Tasia kept flying for another ten seconds, then decided she couldn’t risk it any longer. They were as safe as they were going to be, and if the engines failed completely, the Curiosity would be stranded, unable to get home. In that case, they might as well have let Elisa blast them to bits—at least the end would have been quicker.
The ship had gone the better part of a parsec in only a few minutes, and no Iswander pursuers would be able to find them. Tasia shut everything down and let the Curiosity drift. The system alarms remained loud and scolding, but emergency levels slowly diminished. It seemed to her that the ship was sulking, licking its wounds.
Tasia let out a long exhale and realized she was shaking. “Well, that was fun.”
DD picked himself up from the deck and stood beside Orli. “Perhaps I no longer understand the human concept of fun. I thought I grasped it before. Can you please explain, Orli Covitz?”
Orli wiped her brow. “She’s being sarcastic, DD.”
Robb unbuckled his restraints in the copilot seat. “That wasn’t what we expected to find, but we did discover where Iswander gets his ekti-X.”
“When Garrison and I flew away from Ikbir, we saw countless bloaters drifting in strings, like breadcrumbs in space.” Orli turned to look at Tasia and Robb. “They’re not hard to find.”
“It’s not the bloaters Iswander is trying to hide,” Tasia said. “He doesn’t want anybody to know what they’re made of. After the Duquesne massacre and what just happened to us, there’s no doubt they’re willing to kill to protect the secret.”
“At least Elisa is,” Orli said. “When I met him, Lee Iswander seemed a rational man.”
“She’s operating under his orders, whether they’re explicit or implied,” Tasia said. “Elisa needs to face the music for what she’s done, and so does Iswander.”
Robb headed toward the back of the Curiosity to access the engine compartment. He ran a diagnostic check, studied the automated damage report. “I may need to go outside and do some external fixes.”
DD marched up beside him, bright and helpful. “I can assist. I have a programming module of starship engine specs and repair instructions. Orli Covitz had me help her run the Proud Mary.”
“Then let’s have the compy go outside and do the hard work,” Tasia said.
“I would be happy to.”
Robb removed an environment suit from the equipment locker. “We’ll work out there together. We’ve got spare components for the most critical systems.”
Tasia said, “Meanwhile, Orli and I will compile the evidence and see what we’ve got. There’s enough to make a lot of waves.”
Robb and DD cycled through the airlock, clipped themselves onto the outer hull, and began to replace damaged hull plates. While they swapped out failing stardrive components, Tasia called up the images their forward recorders had captured of the extraction field, the large arrays of ekti-X tanks. Next came the chaotic records from when they were being chased by the security ships and fired upon by Elisa Enturi.
Orli had already cleaned up the log record retrieved from the wrecked Duquesne tanker, which would have been damning enough, but the encounter at the Iswander extraction yards sealed the deal.
Tasia was sickened to remember that Lee Iswander had wanted to become the next clan Speaker, but the Sheol debacle had destroyed his political ambitions. Now Iswander was rebuilding his fortune and his reputation with ekti-X, and her own Kett Shipping had helped him in that. Tasia wanted nothing more than to expose Iswander, and she knew Rlinda Kett was going to approve, even if it cost them a lot of profits.
Shizz, the company could also have continued to make money selling horrific “boutique medical treatments” from Aldo Cerf, but after Xander and Terry’s experience on Dremen, they had put an immediate end to that.
When Orli reviewed the images of the industrial yard, she described what she remembered from the first bloater cluster. Tasia studied the ship configurations at the site, identified a hodgepodge of makes and models. “Looks to me like Iswander bought up all kinds of functional Roamer ships and equipment and modified them to the work here.” She shook her head and knew the best way to bring about Iswander’s downfall, where to hit him that would hurt most.
The Curiosity’s cockpit screens lit up, and the warning lamps switched from amber to green. She called up a report grid, saw that Robb and the compy had even repaired several noncritical systems. “Well, aren’t you two ambitious?”
Over the comm, Robb said, “DD doesn’t like to leave a job incomplete, and it only took a few extra minutes. Besides, Rlinda will be happy to have the Curiosity back in reasonable condition.”
“Now come inside, so we can get out of here.” Tasia was anxious to sound the alarm about Iswander.
By the time Robb and DD cycled back into the Curiosity’s main cabin, Tasia was ready to depart. Robb removed his helmet and stripped off the environment suit. The compy seemed quite pleased with the work they had done.
“Good job, DD,” Orli said.
“The Curiosity will take us where we need to go,” Robb said, then raised his eyebrows. “Which is where exactly?”
“Theroc?” Orli suggested. “Report to the King and Queen? The Confederation can bring down the hammer on Iswander Industries.”
Tasia shook her head. “Considering who he is, and what we saw, there’s a more effective way to shut him down completely.” She felt her face grow hot. “We’ll go to Newstation and address the clan convocation. The Roamers will deal with their own.”