Only Human (15 page)

"They're on my tail, they're on my
tail," Tychon transmitted to his wing, a peculiar note of panic in his
voice. "Bugging out!" Nova watched her sensors, half-amused and
half-angry, as his kite left the planet and headed farther into space. As he
had hoped, several enemy shrills followed in close pursuit.

Find that com relay, Whiteside!

She focused on the ship's sensors, sweeping
widely, ignoring Targon's satellites and the ring of junk floating around the
planet, all of it carefully marked by Union beacons. The one she looked for was
not Union issue and it was most certainly not among the junk.

Got it!
She
sent him coordinates and he raced toward it, apparently by coincidence, dodging
enemy fire at such close quarters that Nova winced every time she perceived a
volley near Tychon.

You've only got a few seconds, Nova.
Make it count.

She prepared for the required and not
entirely safe acceleration, horrified when she saw his kite miscalculate and
start to spin out of control. She listened with growing terror to his static
reply. "Controls out...no fire power...can't..."

Finally, she saw him gain control of his
craft within a concentration of enemy fighters, surrounded and powerless. She
bit her lip, waiting for one of them to decide to take a shot. Seconds passed,
too many seconds. What could they possibly be discussing over there? At last,
they turned with Tychon in their midst, his surrender accepted.

Are you sure about this?
she projected, itching to engage her gun controls.

There it is. Time for you to make an
entrance, Captain.
She received a very clear
impression that any argument would be pointless.

Nova shot toward the point in space to
which the enemy relay beacon had led them. Indeed, her systems warned her that
a jumpsite was about to open - usually a good point in time to move to a safe
distance. She felt, through her sensors, the site open to create a transit
between here and the enemy spanner working on the others side, many light years
away.

Incoming!

Nova cursed. Of course they would have used
the breach to send more planes to Targon rather than waste energy just to
receive a few returning fighters and their captive. She was spotted and
targeted even as she saw Tychon and his hosts catapult into the reach. She felt
a few hits rattle the Eagle's composure but the ship held true and followed her
mental directive to slip into the reach only seconds behind Tychon and the
shrills.

Silence.

A rapid heartbeat, probably her own.

A moment of panic, definitely hers.

Then substance returned into her life and
she looked around, instantly beginning to pick shrills off Tychon's back. The
Eagle's superior armaments took them easily, letting Tychon power up his own
systems again and join the battle.

There she blows!
Nova exclaimed, caught up in the excitement now.

Who what?
Tychon dove under an enemy plane and came up at six.

Enemy carrier ahead.

I see it. Pitiful.

Nova agreed. Not expecting to be found out
here, rebel command had merely sent several squadrons of fighters on a carrier,
barely armed and now poorly defended. Yet any carrier in Tharron's employ and
the spanners it took to move them through uncharted keyholes was a worthwhile
trophy. He was able to replenish his arsenal only at huge expense and great
risk.

Both Nova and Tychon dodged volleys
emitting from her arrays.

How the hell do I blow this up? Got
specs you can magically shove into my head?

You’re not. Can you see me?

She sent an affirmative. Another shrill was
coming up behind him, targeted and destroyed by the Eagle as soon as Nova
perceived its presence.

Thanks. When I take off, head for that
long tower over their bridge. Follow that line down to where you see a dark
patch near a service bay. See it? Good.

You want me to hit that? From here?

That’s the plan. It will disable their power
supply systems. And life support but they’ll be fine for a while. Maybe. On
your left is a small flap with a hexagon on it. Switch the missile selector to
the red line at the end.

Don't tell me...

A minor modification. Let’s hope it’s
enough. Let's do this quickly before they recall the gaggle. You ready?

On your mark.

His kite swooped past the carrier's array
to draw their fire along with the enemy fighters still buzzing around the ship.
Nova directed the Eagle into the opposite direction. A few near-hits glanced
off her shields. Nova muttered a few angry invocations. She knew that a more
direct strike at this distance would make her first Eagle solo flight her last.

She passed over the ship and aimed her
weapon at the point that Tychon had shown her. The missile arrowed toward it,
impacted and pulverized against a shield.

Shielded too hard. Damn. Took out the
gate but not much else.

Tychon thought for only a moment before
issuing his orders.

Nova felt as if he had punched the air out
of her lungs. The audacity of his proposal was too outrageous for her to even
begin to protest. She could do little but stare breathlessly at her monitors as
he aligned his plane with the damaged gate and programmed a short flight
sequence. Then she saw his canopy open and Tychon, complete with pilot couch,
catapult into space. Seconds later, his plane collided with the enemy carrier, punched
through the weak spot and drove deep into her interior.

Nova immediately dropped the Eagle to hover
between the transport and Tychon to shield him as his kite succeeded in
breaking the large ship into several pieces. She cringed when she felt pieces
of the hull impact against the Eagle's shields.

"Ty!" she shouted and recast her
sensors to follow his trajectory away from the blast.

It really, really hurts when you do
that, Captain. Don't shout into someone's brain like that. Now if you could
come and get me we could get out of here.

I’m still collecting shrapnel for you.

Kind of you. Let's see if we can fish me
out of this pond before I run out of air. Open the cargo bay door.

You'll have to duck. I might have
forgotten to secure the galley bins.

Can you see what I'm seeing?

Sort of
, she
acknowledged.
More like I know what you're seeing. Damn, shrill coming at
us!
She shot away, far enough to flip the Eagle and return, taking the
enemy ship head-on. It flung a wide swath of debris and she felt parts collide
with the ship
.
Please tell me you didn't catch any of that!

I'm all right,
came the unruffled reply.
Focus on what I'm seeing. I'll guide
you here. Don't use real-vid or it'll feel like you're looking in a mirror.
Just feel me. Drop the shields and spin down the gravity. Once I get close
enough the Eagle should start pulling me. I'd like to end up inside the bay,
not stuck to the hull.

She carefully directed the ship, relying on
his infinite patience to help her nudge the Eagle toward where he floated, his
suit and the small store of oxygen in his seat the only thing between him and
the cold nothing of space. She closed her eyes as she edged closer to him,
aware of how small the cargo gate suddenly appeared. It seemed an eternity
before he slipped into the bay, using the container rail to pull himself
inside. She gasped for breath that she hadn't been aware of holding as she restored
gravity and air pressure.

Only moments later, he sauntered into the
cabin, grinning triumphantly as he removed his helmet and gloves.

That was some fancy footwork, Captain.
Headwork.

Nova jumped out of her couch, barely taking
a moment to remove her headset. “Are you out of your mind?”

He sent a mental question.

“That was damn risky, Tychon! What if I
hadn't been able to get through the reach? What if they hadn't been interested
in captives?"

"They would not turn their noses up at
a free kite, not even a damaged one."

"That is supposing an awful lot! Punching
out in the middle of nowhere? You could have been killed!"

"I got that idea from you,
actually."

"I bailed with a parachute, not in
space! What if you'd been hit by some of that junk? What if we hadn't managed
to pick you up? You'd still be floating around out there. We're alone here and
no one knows where we are. If you haven't noticed, we don't have a spare
spanner on board."

"Welcome to the Vanguard, Captain.
This is what we do here. Of course there were risks. But they were a lot lower
because I know you can keep it together. At least during a scramble, if not
after."

 Her shoulders slumped. "You're a
madman. Sir."

 
Thank you for worrying about me,
he
said silently. He stepped closer to her and adjusted his hands around her head.

 "What are you doing now?"

 
Closing the khamal
.

 "The what?" Nova felt his touch
within her mind. As a door closes, so the link between them shut. She could no
longer receive his thoughts. She felt a brief sensation of loss, as if he had
taken away something that had been an almost physical comfort.

He looked into her eyes for a long moment
before he removed his hands from her face. "All right?"

She nodded and quickly stepped away.

"It's called a khamal. This one is
just telepathy of sorts. Not all species are receptive to it. Your interface
did most of the work. Khamal is a broad term, really. It just describes any one
of many states of perception or consciousness. To us even sleep is a
khamal."

 "How many are there?"

 "That depends on how well trained you
are. I can use five or six. Some people can produce more than twenty that I
know of. Originally, the main purpose of the khamal was to achieve serenity, to
help in prayer and meditation. Most of us are usually in one state of khamal or
another. Certain forms of khamal are used for communication and teaching,
others for healing. People sharing a khamal must be touching when it begins and
ends."

“Why don’t we always talk like this? In our
heads.”

“It takes a lot of energy and
concentration. And it gives me a nasty headache. Probably because you’re not
Delphian and I have to use your nodes to reach you. I’d ask one of our healers
about that but I have the feeling they won’t like me even telling an
off-worlder about this, never mind engaging in it.”

 "Can I learn this?"

 "Not this one, Human. I can teach you
some other ones. Like how to stay calm and not shout at your commanding
officer."

 She moved ahead of him into the cockpit.
"Nothing left out there but salvage." She cast the ship's sensors to get
a bearing on their location and then got a bearing on the cabin. Every loose
object had floated free during the rescue and now lay scattered over the floor
of the ship. "And since it's your fault that we had to go zero-G, you get
to clean this place up, Major."

He surveyed the cabin to see her boots, her
helmet, her reader, her gun, her tea bottle, her unfinished charts and several
pretty combs that also weren't his. He sighed and dropped heavily onto his
couch. "You're going to have to jump, Greenie. I think I got a little
buzzed out there." He held up his hand to show her his fingernails.
"Not that you can tell if I turn blue."

"I think you just made a joke."

"It's the hypoxia, I think." He
fastened an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose.

"Just in case you are seriously
impaired, can I remind you, Major, that I've never spanned a reach on my own
before? I'm just a chartjumper, remember? Not a genius."

"It'll be fine," he said, his
voice muffled. "The beacon they posted will still be near Targon. So it's
sort of like being charted. Just not stable. Let the ship find the keyhole and
then look for the beacon. I'll be right here."

"If you're sure..." she said,
already engaging her interface, hoping that he would not suddenly come to his
senses and remember established operating procedure.

"Breach the reach, Skipper!"

* * *

Targon was in a state of celebration when
the Eagle touched down in the central hangar. A cheer rolled through the crowd
when her pilots descended along the lowered rear gate. Overhead, a large screen
looped a video that Nova had sent of the enemy carrier falling apart. The
exuberant crowd shouted approval each time they saw the Major's chair eject
from his kite.

Nova blushed, unaccustomed to so much
attention. Tychon winced when he saw the display and hoped to avoid Colonel
Carras for a while.