“I promise you, we’ll send out word of this to the authorities as soon as we’re clear of planetary interference,” Calum said. “Now, if you’ll just step back, we’d best be off.”
Acorna had disappeared the instant she had the ‘ponies’ replacements, so it was up to him to get them safely away.
Calum carefully lifted the AcaSecki in low-energy mode before touching the thrusters lightly enough to move far enough away from the flooded land to start an ascent. He wasn’t sure who he was maddest at: Acorna for using a piece of her own self to provide the purification for those poor farmers, or the frigging bastards holding an entire world to ransom with weather tricks. And where had they gotten such tricks FROM in the first place?
He was far too busy laying in a course to access the Galacticapedia, but he would as soon as he had a finger free. As far as he knew, there was no process that could deliver rain to one area of a planet, lightning on command to another, and relentless sun to bake a third. That was undoubtedly why he didn’t check the screen until he felt the unmistakable yank of a tractor beam … a very powerful tractor beam … snatching the AcaSeckl right off her ascent and inexorably into the maw of a massive spaceship, no doubt owned and manned by the Starfarers.
five
Haven, Unified Federation Date 334.05.17
Calum tried desperately to send a Mayday to Maganos, but they’d been ahead of him all along, and his signal bounced harmlessly back.
Calum was damning himself left, right, and center before Acorna came running to the bridge.
“What are you doing, Calum? I nearly lost the can …” Her complaint trailed off as the lights from their captor nearly blinded her.
“The Starfarers?”
“Sorry about this, Acorna,” he said, mortified. “Rafik and Gill would never have been so stupid as not to check the trajectory, much less the proximity screens.”
“Well, I’ve a few choice words for such scummy piratical opportunists. …”
She was so angry her horn glowed, and Calum buried his head in his arms. He’d done it now. Truly he’d done it. How was he going to save Acorna from this? He only hoped the Starfarers had been so busy with their felonious extortion that no hint of a strange species with a horn had reached their com unit.
“Acorna,” and his voice cracked in his anxiety, “could you pretend to be a pet?”
“A pet?”
“It’s the only thing I can think of.”
Acorna stood very still, her tall form dwarfing him in the pilot’s chair. She gave a little sniff, her wide silvery eyes regarding him. “I don’t think they’d buy that.” i
“Then let’s play it as cool as possible.”
“That makes sense.”
“And this time you’ve never heard of Delszaki Li and House Harakamian. When I can think what they’d hold Hafiz up for, much less Mr. Li, my heart fails me.”
“You’ve made a very good point.”
The AcaSeckl shivered, if a metal ship can be said to do such a thing, as she was locked into place aboard their captor.
“While I can’t be a pet, Calum, I can be a Didi,” she said, and was off down the corridor, shouting over one shoulder, “You be the pet, this time, Calum. Just bright enough to speak when spoken to.”
He reviewed that in his mind as he felt other things happening to ?????????????, like the clang of metal against the main hatch. They were unlikely to be able to break through, but what if they decided to blow or shoot the hatch off? Better to surrender and maintain the ship intact. He quickly keyed in a code and turned off the system with the special switch he himself had installed. Let ‘em try to break that, he thought with some satisfaction.
Then he switched on the exterior speakers. “Wait a damned minute, willya?” He flipped off the security lock on the hatch. Anyone could open it now from outside. “I’m coming. I’m coming. Doan like no one messing up the ship. My Didi’ll get back at me if’n you do.”