A quetzal in the compound? Five more trying to get in? The desire to wheel around, fly full-throttle for PA, tore at Talina’s soul. She should be there. No one knew how to hunt quetzals like she did.
Down in her gut, Demon hissed, “Got you, didn’t we?”
“Yeah? Bet there’s going to be nothing but steaks and leather by nightfall, you creepy little shit.”
Talina took her heading for Tyson. As much as she yearned to head for PA, Kalico, Dya, and Talbot needed her. First hand, she knew the sense of desperation that came from being lost in the forest.
“So, from Two Spot’s report, it was six of them. Three on the Mine Gate, three from the shuttle field.” Talina shot a glance at Kylee. “That’s a whole new tactic. And in the middle of the day.”
“Whitey really hates you, huh?” Kylee gave Talina an evaluative blue-eyed stare.
“Yeah, lucky me.”
Demon tried to claw at her stomach, hissing in rage.
Piece of shit.
Talina checked her compass and airspeed. Below her the wild Donovanian terrain unfolded and flowed. The airtruck responded instantly to the touch. The fans and gimbals were all tight, within tolerance. Ungainly as the airtruck looked, it handled like a dream, a reassuring feeling after all of these years. Hard to believe that the power indicator really meant what it said. Reliable. So good that she could partially ignore that constant and nagging worry about what to do if they went down. How damn long had it been since she could fly without fear?
Dek was scrunched in the corner of the cab, back to the door. He kept staring in disbelief at Flute. The look on his face was priceless: Like the guy just knew the terrified quetzal was going leap across the cargo box and eat him.
Not a chance given that Flute was flashing the bright yellow-and-black patterns of terror mixed with teal anxiety spots in addition to glowing way down in the infrared.
Quetzals really hated to fly. That he’d dared it at all was mark of the beast’s affection for Kylee and perhaps Dya. Or—who knew?—it was some other quetzal experiment cooked up by his lineage.
Kylee stepped up to the dash beside Talina, her gaze fixed on the landscape. In a voice barely above a whisper, she said, “He’s not ready, you know.”
“Flute? Then why’d you insist he come along?”
“I mean Dek.”
“He wanted a taste of Donovan. As long as he just stays in the airtruck, keeps it out of the cannibals’ hands, he’ll be all right.”
“You’re not setting us down at Tyson, so that means we’re setting down in the forest. You’ve got a place in mind?”
“Ridgetop, a couple of kilometers north and above. Mostly basalt bedrock. If Dek locks the doors, shoots anything that tries to force its way in, he’ll be all right. And I’ll set the radio on the PA frequency before we go. If something happens, Shig can have Manny Bateman run the shuttle out to pick him up after they mop up this quetzal trouble.”
Kylee shrugged.
Talina shot Kylee a questioning look. “Did he shoot that fastbreak this morning, or did you?”
“He did. He listens well, but he’s still weak from being on that ship. I get what you see in him. With the right luck, he might make it. Really different than Cap, though. This one’s more centered. If Donovan doesn’t kill him, he could be a full partner.”
“Got it all figured out, huh?”
“He’s a world of improvement over Bucky Berkholtz.”
“There’s times I wish you didn’t have so much of me in you.”
“No, you don’t.”
“And why’s that, kid?”
Kylee flipped her hair back, grinned. “Because every time I want to lose it, want to fucking scream, and cry, and beat the crap out of Tip, or unload all my frustrations on Madison, you’re there. Down deep. It’s like having a big sister inside my head. At first, I hated it. Really, really, hated it. Now I’m the most thankful girl on the planet.”
“Glad to be of service. Having you inside me . . . well, it’s a balance. Keeps me on track with all these asshole quetzals running around inside my skull.”
Kylee nodded, her worried gaze fixing on the horizon. “Think Mom’s okay?”
“Don’t know, kid. Nobody in their right mind wants to take a chance on the forest, not without a full set of armor and tech. If it was anybody but your mom and dad, I’d say write it off. And as good as your mom is, Talbot’s even better. Maybe as good as anyone on the planet when it comes to staying alive.”
“He’s not us,” Kylee countered, referring to the quetzal in their blood. “And we’ve got Flute.”
“Which is why we’ll find them.”
“You think this lockdown could be Whitey?”
“Bet on it. That snot-sucker’s still ahead of me. Killed a prospector last month. Old Chin Hua Mao. As good a veteran Wild One as you’ll find in the bush. Somehow Whitey, or of one of his lineage, got old Chin by surprise while he was working his claim in the Blood Mountains.”
“There,” Kylee pointed. Having spotted Tyson in the distance.
Talina keyed the radio. “Kalico? Mark? Dya? Do you read? Come in. Kalico? Mark? Dya? If you can—”
“Got ya, Tal,” Kalico’s voice came faintly through the receiver. “We’re about a half klick west of Tyson, moving slowly. Where are you?”
“Coming in from the east in the airtruck. Anyplace I can set down?”
“Negative on that. We’re on the floodplain below the basalt. Trees are four hundred meters tall if they’re an inch. We’ll have to find someplace open enough you can drop down.”
“What’s your situation? Who’s with you?”
Beside her, Kylee went as tight as a coiled spring.
“Me, Talbot, Dya, and Muldare are still out here. We think Carson’s dead and the Unreconciled have his weapon. Consider Tyson hostile. Repeat, Tyson is hostile. You copy that?”
“Roger that.” Talina keyed the mic again, calling, “Two Spot, you get that relay?”
“Affirmative.”
Talina circled wide of Tyson Station, peering down through the windscreen as she did. It was to see a handful of people watching from the domes, some waving her in. As the angle changed, she spotted a few more. Not more than seven visible in the whole compound.
“What do you think?” Kylee asked as they curled around to the west. A person need only look down on the vegetation to know where the deep forest lay and where shallow bedrock restricted the size of the trees.
Talina keyed the mic. “Supervisor? If my calculations are correct, we should be right above you. Trees are definitely too thick to attempt a descent here. Canopy looks like it’s woven as tight as a blanket.”
Talbot’s voice came through. “You find a safe place to put down. We’ll beat feet to wherever you are.”
Talina drifted them north, searching. There had to be a hole, something with a rocky outcrop where the roots hadn’t taken hold. The last thing they needed was to set down and have roots wind themselves around the fan blades.
And there, she saw it. An opening in the canopy. One of the weird lime-green trees with those monstrous paddle-shaped branches. It stood like an isolate out in the center, but if Talina could slide down along the margin of the branches, she could drop them at the edge of the root zone.
“Kalico?” Tal keyed the mic. “We’re maybe a kilometer to the north and west. Got a hole. We’re going to ground.”
“Roger that. Got a reading on my signal?”
“Affirmative.” Talina plotted the fix, glanced at her compass. “We’re north, twenty-five degrees west. Figure that we’ll meet you halfway. After we’re all loaded, it’ll be three hours to supper and beer at Briggs’ place.”
“Best news we’ve heard all day. Got any water? Repeat: We need water.”
“We’ll bring some.” Talina smiled at that, gave Kylee a reassuring wink, and began her descent. She dropped the airtruck down just out of reach of the waving branches. As she did, the chabacho and aquajade leaves kept turning her way, pulling back from the downdraft created by the fans.
Even the vines retreated, and here and there, some forest creature vanished into the darkness, fleeing in panic as the airtruck roared past.
“Kylee, grab a couple of water bottles. Dek, you lock the door after the last of us is out. I’m putting us on the edge of the root mat. If you see them creeping toward the airtruck, you call me ASAP on the radio. I’ll beat feet back and lift us off before they can latch hold of the frame or tangle in the fans.”
“You sure you don’t want me to just take the controls and hover?”
“You can fly this thing?”
Taglioni shrugged. “It’s been a while. Looks like standard controls. Nothing different from my old Beta Falcon.”
Talina grinned as she set them softly on the dark-gray soil just beyond the edge of the roots. “My, you’re just one surprise after another, aren’t you? Why didn’t you say something?”
“You never asked.” He was watching out the side window, staring at the weird lime-green tree where it stood maybe fifty meters away in the center of the clearing. “What is that thing? You got a name for it?”
Tal glanced, noticed the gigantic leaves—somehow reminding her of the woven handheld palm fans of her youth—had turned their way. Reacted to their descent.
“Nothing official,” she replied. “Iji calls them lollipop trees. I heard Talbot call it a ping-pong-paddle tree. We’ve never had the time or people to fully study them, let alone a lot of Donovanian life. That’s what Tyson Station was originally all about. If there were any notes about those trees, they never survived the evacuation.”
Kylee unlatched the door to stare out thoughtfully, her nose working, as if she’d pick up anything beyond the stench of exhaust and hot motors.
“Let’s go, people,” Talina called, pulling her rifle from the rack. “We’ve only got a couple of hours before dark. Flute? We’re here. You can open your eyes and turn blue and pink now. You survived your first flight.”
An eye popped open on the top of the terrified quetzal’s head. It focused on the open door. The beast damn near bowled Kylee off her feet as it rushed to make its escape.
“Hey! Don’t be an asshole!” Kylee shouted at the departed quetzal, then slung her backpack with the extra water over one shoulder, grinned, and leaped out after Flute.
Talina handed Dek his rifle, saying, “Keep the door closed. Anything tries to get in that’s not us? Shoot it.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Dek took his rifle.
“Talina!” Kylee’s scream brought Talina to the door, her heart skipping a beat.
Kylee was standing at the edge of the root mat, staring up over the top of the airtruck. Flute, too, was fixed on whatever was up there, his panicked colors instantly gone, replaced by perfect camouflage as he hunched down and blended with the background. Only his three gleaming black eyes were visible.
Talina leaped to the ground, whirled, bringing her rifle up.
For a moment, she could only blink at the impossibility of it.
The ping pong paddle tree was moving, bending. The fifty or so giant paddle fans—each maybe ten to fifteen meters across—were glowing in eerie viridian as it leaned toward them, the bulk of it hidden by the airtruck.
“Dek!” she screamed. “Get out of there!”
As she did, the first of the big paddles slapped down on the top of the airtruck with a solid thump. Another pasted itself against the tailgate, shivering the truck. Dek, in the open door, was knocked free. Rifle in hand, he tumbled to the ground—barely kept himself from landing face-first.
“What the hell?” Talina barely whispered as the airtruck was shaken as if it were a toy. The huge paddles had conformed and latched onto the top and sides. And then the tree began to straighten, lifting the vehicle as if it were a feather.
Behind her right ear, Rocket’s sibilant voice told her: “Run!”