Page 114 of Blightfall

Stars, what did I think we were going to do? We were two scudding ships against whatever Ivy had at her disposal.

Still, I wasn’t going to leave the people in the arena undefended.

“Let’s do this,” I said. “Shoot down the enemy ships. Keep them from targeting the civilians in the arena. If you take out a ship, make sure to catch that wreckage. Do not let it drop over the civilians. Copy?”

“Copy!” Gilaf said, “though the light-lance on this ship is broken, so you’ll have to do the catching.”

“Noted,” I said, and we both shot through the trees, flying toward the arena.

The enemy ships had already arrived, and one fired down into the crowd, destructor fire scattering over the stands.

Stars, people were already dying. We didn’t have a moment to waste, and we had to be careful or we’d rain down hell on both the arena and the surrounding city. Gilaf reached the ships first, weaving in front of them and drawing their attention upward and away from the crowd.

The enemy ships weren’t as discerning with their destructors, and Gilaf suffered a hit, but succeeded in leading some of the ships away from the arena.

“I can hear Ivy over the hypercomm instructing the pilots,” Alanik said. Those communications were cytonic, which allowed Alanik to intercept them. “They’re going to target Dayan and Bob so they can’t keep talking.”

That made sense. Ivy wanted control again. I soared over the open top of the arena and flipped an Imban turn, ready to shoot down anything that targeted Dayan and the other gladiators.

“By the branches,” Alanik said.

“What?” I asked.

“I can’t hear them anymore,” she said. “One of those ships is carrying an inhibitor.”

Oh, scud. The Superiority had only put inhibitors in capital ships, not in small fighters. But Ivy was clearly not working with the Superiority, or playing by their rules. “You’ve lost your cytonics?” I asked.

“Yes,” Alanik said. “I can’t hear the hypercomm, and I can’t hyperjump us out of here if this goes wrong.”

Scud. We were two ships against the enemy’s armada, without the use of any of our cytonic assets to aid our cause. Wham, Squeeze, Alanik herself, all neutralized.

“Amphi?” Gilaf said. “Orders?”

We could run. We could turn tail, speed out of inhibitor range, and get the hell out of here. Sadie and Nedd should be in the nowhere by now. We might be able to find a different way to get them out, or sneak back in and go after them when the carnage was over.

But our mission was to open a path to diplomatic relations with these humans. Those starfighters were after them because of us. We’d brought this hellfire down on them.

We couldn’t abandon them to this. We wouldn’t.

“Protect the civilians,” I said. “Defend the arena. We might not be able to save them all, but we are damn well going to try.”

Beside me, Alanik nodded. Suki held up her little fist in approval. They were willing to die here beside me to prevent this atrocity.

I just hoped the sacrifice wouldn’t be for nothing.

Interlude

Bob was a friendly slug. Bob was a powerful slug. Bob had the power to speak to many, many friends at once. Bob wanted to tell the many, many new friends that they were all now friends. They would not fight. Instead, they would all cuddle. It would take a long time for Bob to cuddle so many, but Bob was up to the challenge.

Instead, Bob spoke for Dayan. Dayan said many words. Bob hoped they were good words. The friends did not begin to cuddle, so Bob was not sure the words were so so good. Maybe next time, Dayan would use cuddlier words. Cuddles were good. Dayan would see.

Ships had come for Bob and Bob’s friends. The pilots flying the ships were not Bob’s friends. The pilots flying the ships were far away, and they did not want to cuddle with Bob. Bob’s new slug friends were on those ships. Bob’s new slug friends were scared.

One of Bob’s new friends created a Cloud. The Cloud came near. Naga could not pop to get those slug friends in the Cloud. When the Cloud arrived, the Cloud would stop Bob from being able to talk.

Naga! Bob said. Come! Quick!

Naga popped onto Dayan’s shoulder with Bob.