Chapter 53

Martienne’s cursing was the first clue Connor had that something was up. He stepped through the bridge hatch into a blistering string of what he thought might be French, but even in that dead language caught words that had survived.

They weren’t happy and pleasant words.

She twisted around, her face twisted in a scowl. “This is unbelievable.”

Armor clattering in his hand, he hurried forward to get a look over her shoulder.

His gut twisted in anxiety. They couldn’t afford more problems. He pulled up short when the main display flipped from a view of the night sky to a map of some sort.

The pilot pointed to the display. “Recognize this? Hm?”

“Should I?” Connor leaned closer to the image and caught a whiff of the medicine and blood smell coming off her.

It was a reminder that he wasn’t the only one who hadn’t had a chance to clean up. Even if he hadn’t slept the entire time the rest of the team had been on the planet below, he’d had it easier. The fatigue he was feeling was nothing compared to what they must be feeling.

“The client’s coordinates.” Martienne looked at Connor like he was an idiot.

“I should’ve thought of that. Sorry. I’m a little frazzled.”

“You have pushed hard, yes. Those coordinates, this is the region they are in. Here—” She pointed to the map, and a green shape like a slingshot flared on the map. “—is where he suggests we land.”

“All right.”

There was no obvious scale to the map, but it looked like a decent-sized clearing with some altitude.

Would the area around the clearing be the same sort of strange forest?

Martienne tapped keys on her console, and the image on the main display shifted.

A belly camera operating in ultraviolet. Everything was tinted green.

Pointed treetops whipped by below, swaying—maybe from wind, maybe from the Lucky Sevens’s exhaust.

Maybe from huge, strange birds.

But he couldn’t see any of the animals clinging to the pointed tips. Instead, there were the occasional flashes of almost white lines, like moonlight reflecting off cabling.

Connor couldn’t help leaning in again. “Those look similar to the trees—”

“A moment.” She tapped another key, and the map reappeared, becoming an overlay on the trees.

The clearing was just ahead of them, maybe a minute out based on the speed they were moving.

Then they were over it.

It was clear of trees, but he couldn’t make out much detail in the ultraviolet.

Martienne flipped a switch, and floodlights lit the ground below: rock that sloped gently down twenty or more meters to a gulley of some sort. There were no boulders or crevices to block a landing, and even with the slope, the ground seemed smooth enough for a landing.

It wouldn’t be good for maintenance, though. Drew would be doing all the work on the landing gear at an angle.

Something skittered across the rock: not too much larger than a human, a deep green, in the display, standing on two legs, twisting around to reveal a long, almost reptilian head that stared into the light.

Then it skittered away, leaping over the side of the raised rock.

His stomach knotted. “What was that?”

“I can say what they are not: humans.” The pilot shook her head. “And they are everywhere down there—moving among those tree-stalks.”

“We can’t put down there.”

“No.” She tapped more keys, and the view of the map returned. Another area—almost rectangular—was highlighted. “This is also a clearing. A hundred kilometers or more out.”

“That’s a long way.”

“It is, but it is not so far from the place this client wishes to go. Maybe another ten kilometers.”

A red highlight appeared on the map, an irregular circle that gave the impression of a pit. It was almost midway between the two landing spots, just as Martienne had said.

Connor relaxed slightly. “Let’s give it a look.”

The pilot nodded, but she rubbed the bandaged area on her head. “This place…”

“I know. It’s terrible. But if we can pull this job off, we’ll have everything we need to get back on our feet again.”

“On our feet? Do you mean in our graves?”

Connor chuckled, but there was no fooling the grumpy pilot with false bravado. “I need to check on Vicente.”

It wasn’t just an excuse to escape further complaint. The Moon twins should have had time to get with the heavy weapons expert and start work on their ammunition problem. They really did need a solution, even if the bugs weren’t in the area.

The planet was apparently covered with bizarre life, and it all seemed threatening.

He found the twins in the galley, following the pungent smell of garlic. Vicente sat alone at a table staring at them as they plucked some sort of pickled vegetable out of ceramic containers. They’d all cleaned up and changed but looked ready to pass out.

Vicente’s head came around, and he looked Connor up and down. “Crazy thing you did down there, Boss.”

“I wanted everyone to get out alive.”

“Still crazy.” The big man rubbed a bandage. “The boys here say you want to change our ammo up.”

“We need some way to do more damage: stopping power instead of penetration.”

“Two problems.” Vicente nodded at the brothers.

Tim pushed his pickled vegetables away. “Not enough ammunition. That’s one.”

Tom gulped down a red-stained leafy thing. “Two: Not enough time.”

Connor pulled a chair out and settled across the table from Vicente. “So tell me what we can do.”

Vicente made chopping motions. “You got anymore of those swords, Boss?”

“Those aren’t practical.”

“Looks good, though.” The big man guffawed. “Is that how you got your pretty gal? Hm?”

Connor didn’t take the bait. “Tim? Tom?”

Tim, the taller twin, scratched the scalp beneath his fire-like hair. “Maybe a hundred bullets. Set them up to fragment. It won’t be like real fragmenting rounds.”

Vicente snorted. “Won’t be enough to make a difference, Boss.”

“We have to do something.” Connor would have liked to have seen the bodies of the killed creatures. Maybe they could have learned something with a few corpses. “Spread the bullets among everyone. Give the bulk to the critical shooters.”

“Me and Rudy.” The big man jerked his head up, toward the living quarters. “Kalpana.”

Tom held his hands up in protest. “Hey!”

“The Moons.” Vicente rolled his eyes. “You guys even hit anything?”

“Killed five myself.” Tom cocked his head at Tim. “You get one?”

The taller twin stared at the fluid floating inside his container. “I’ve got fifteen thousand wings saved up. When I get back, I want to buy shares in Dad’s company, y’know?”

Tom shook his brother’s shoulder. “C’mon. We got work to do.”

They rose, gathered their containers, cleaned their space, and exited the galley.

Vicente’s neck craned his head around to glance out the opening, then he sat back with a soft groan. “It’s a messy job, Boss.”

“I know.”

“It was good seeing you use a gun.”

Connor rose and pushed his chair back in. “These things aren’t human.”

“I don’t know what they are, Boss, but I know they’re bad. And I know they want to kill us.”

Although Connor couldn’t say it, he was thinking the same thing.