"I do not think so," Draycos said, his voice as strange as Grisko's. "Are there emergency escape devices aboard this aircraft?"
Jack frowned. "What in the world—?"
"Do not argue," Draycos snapped, shooting out of Jack's collar to land on the deck behind him. Suddenly the dragon seemed charged with energy and nervous tension.
"We must leave this vehicle at once. Are there escape devices aboard?"
"I can check," Jack said, the urgency in the dragon's voice silencing all questions. "Can you fly this thing?"
"Yes," Draycos said, moving aside to let Jack out of the pilot's seat. "Go. Quickly."
There was a tall storage cabinet built into the wall beside the exit hatchway. Jack started toward it, then changed his mind and instead got down on his knees beside the nearest row of seats.
His second hunch turned out to be right. Strapped beneath each seat was the orange-striped plastic bag of a drop-pack. "Got it," he reported, pulling one free.
"How high must we be to use it?" Draycos asked. He was, Jack saw, curled partially on his side in the pilot's seat, his paws on the transport's controls.
"As high or as low as you want," Jack told him. "It's not like a parachute or hang glider where you need altitude for it to work."
"Then prepare yourself and wait by the door."
"Right," Jack said, ripping open the package tab and heading aft. The drop-pack was similar to the ones he and Uncle Virgil had used once in a midnight skulk onto the roof of a high-rise bank, except that this one had the typical drab-ness of military surplus. By the time he reached the hatchway, he had it on. "Ready," he called.
"Stand prepared to open the hatchway," Draycos ordered. "When I come to you, we will jump."
Jack took a deep breath, checking all the drop-pack's straps one final time. The scariest part was that he still didn't know what had spooked the dragon so badly. But anything that worried a poet-warrior of the K'da was definitely something he wanted to be worried about, too.
His eyes fell on the cabinet beside the hatchway. On impulse, he pulled it open.
Originally, he'd thought to find the drop-packs in there. What he found instead was actually more reasonable considering the Flying Turtle's owners.
The cabinet was a weapons locker. The entire top half was filled with the sort of small machine guns Lieutenant Cue Ball and his men had been carrying, with the middle part taken up by shelves full of ammo clips for the guns. At the bottom, looking almost like an afterthought, was a rack holding six slapsticks.
Jack hesitated. The heavier weapons were tempting, but only for a second. Machine guns were mid-range weapons, which was good; but they were also lethal and very noisy, neither of which was what he wanted right now. The slapsticks, on the other hand, were dead quiet and did nothing but knock out your target with an electric shock.
Of course, you also had to get close enough to physically touch him. But you couldn't have everything. Pulling out one of the slapsticks, he made sure it was fully charged, checked to see that the safety catch was on, then stuck it in his belt.
"Prepare," Draycos called.
"Ready," Jack called back, getting a grip on the drop-pack rip cord with one hand and resting the other on the hatchway release pad.
And suddenly, in a flash of golden scales, Draycos spun around and dived out of the pilot's chair. Hitting the top of one of the rows of seats, he shoved off it and bounded toward the hatch.
Jack was ready. He slapped the release; and as the sudden hurricane of wind tore at his hair and clothes he stretched his hand out toward Draycos.
The outstretched forepaws struck his palm and the dragon melted up his sleeve. Pulling the rip cord, Jack pushed off backwards into the night.
The wind grabbed him, and for a horribly tangled second it threw him around, turning him upside down and twice slapping him in the face. It was like being thrown into a raging river made up of air instead of water.
Then the tiny thrusters built into the drop-pack kicked into action. They turned him upright, slowing both his descent and his forward motion. The wind faded, one last set of tree branches grabbed at his sleeve as he passed, and then his feet slapped more or less gently into the crunchy mat of leaves.
"Whew!" he puffed, regaining his balance and looking around. They had landed in a reasonably clear area on a small rise, giving him a good view forward.
There, fading into the distance, he could see their transport. It was still skimming cheerfully away into the night, with no hint of mechanical trouble that he could see.
He shook his head, wondering how many miles they were now going to have to walk. "I don't suppose you happen to know where we are?" he asked.
And then, before Draycos could answer, there was a flicker of light in the distance. Something dark and half-seen seemed to curve up from the forest.
And with a brilliant flash, it exploded against the underside of the Flying Turtle.
CHAPTER 21
The air went out of Jack as if he'd been kicked in the stomach. "Wha—?" he gasped, staring in disbelief at the fireball still hugging the underside of the transport. No—it was impossible.
But even as he watched, even as his mind tried to convince itself that he wasn't seeing what he was seeing, a second object rose from the forest, and a second explosion blasted at the transport's underside.
"That attack was meant for us," Draycos said, his voice low and grim as his head rose from Jack's shoulder. "I see your military vehicles are well equipped with ventral armor."
The words seemed to bounce around Jack's brain like angry hornets trying to get through a window. "What are you talking about?" he heard himself say.
"Ventral armor," Draycos repeated. "Protection for the underside of the craft. Designed to protect the troops being carried."
Jack tore his eyes away from the Flying Turtle, wavering but still holding together, and stared at the dragon's face. "Are you insane?" he demanded. "Someone just tried to kill us, and you're talking equipment specs?"
"Be calm, Jack," Draycos advised. With a surge of weight and pressure, he leaped out of Jack's collar and landed on the ground in front of him. "I do not believe they intended to kill you. I believe they meant only to disable the craft, so that you could be taken prisoner."
A distant clattering sound wafted toward them on the night air, like a bunch of spoons that had been dropped into a sausage grinder. Jack looked over, to find that the Flying Turtle had finally given up and disappeared into the trees.
He didn't have any trouble seeing where it had landed, though. The reddish glow of the fire from its burning fuel tanks was plainly visible.
"I don't believe this," he muttered. "They shot down one of their own transports just so they could grab me again? That's crazy. They already know I can't get them into our computers."
Draycos twisted his long neck. "You misunderstand, Jack," he said darkly. "It was not the Shamshir who did this."
Jack frowned at him. "You can't be serious."
"I am very serious," Draycos assured him. "It was the Whinyard's Edge who shot down the transport."
"But that doesn't make sense," Jack protested. "I was already on my way to meet them. Why shoot at me?"
"I do not know," Draycos said. "But remember: Sergeant Grisko asked if you were strapped in. And he instructed you to keep your course steady."
"That was just a figure of speech," Jack muttered. But even as he argued, he knew down deep that he was batting at flies here. He'd spent over two weeks with Grisko, and never in that time had he heard the man utter a single word of concern for anyone's safety. Plus, there'd been that odd tone in his voice just before he signed off.
And he and Uncle Virgil had been betrayed too many times over the years for him not to know what it felt like to be stabbed in the back.
"But why?" he asked. "What did I ever do to him?"
"That is what we must find out," Draycos declared.
The dragon had been gazing out at the sky as if trying to find constellat
ions in the unfamiliar star patterns. Now, he looked back at Jack and flipped his tail up in front of the boy's face. "The sky is clear of watchers. Take hold."
"Wait a second," Jack protested even as he got a grip on the end of the dragon's tail. "Where are we going?"
Draycos lifted a forepaw. "The transport is there," he said, pointing a forepaw toward the glow. "The Kilo Seven outpost is there," he went on, shifting his forepaw about forty-five degrees to the right. "Between them is the sentry cage you occupied earlier this evening. I wish to intercept them near there."
"Yeah, well, just wait a second," Jack said cautiously. This whole thing had to be some kind of huge misunderstanding. The last thing he wanted was for a gung ho K'da warrior to go off the high dive into the revenge pool. "They didn't kill anyone. Right? No hospital, no foul."
Draycos tossed his head. "You misunderstand, Jack," he said. "I do not seek vengeance, but information."
"And how exactly do you expect to get it?"
"We shall see," Draycos said. "Now. Let us go."
Earlier that night—was it still just the same night?—Jack had hurried back from the sentry cage to the outpost. At the time, he would have sworn that that was as fast as it was possible for him to travel through a dark forest without breaking a leg or clotheslining himself on a low-hanging branch.
He'd been wrong. He'd been very wrong.
They raced through the forest. Not a quick walk, not a cautious jog, but a flat-out run. Draycos was in a hurry; and a K'da warrior in a hurry was a sight to behold.
And the most astonishing part of it was that Jack never even so much as twisted an ankle.
He never did figure that one out. Yes, he knew that Draycos had a different kind of eyesight than humans, which clearly included better night vision along with the rest of the package. And yes, the dragon also had training and experience in moving around different types of terrain.
But that only explained how Draycos kept from hurting himself. How he managed to also keep Jack's feet from finding any dips or tree roots along the way remained a mystery.
For the first ten minutes or so Draycos kept the pace as fast as Jack could manage, stopping every couple of hundred yards for a quick breather. Or at least, that was what Jack first thought the rest stops were for. It was only after the third one that he realized the dragon wasn't so much calling a time-out as he was pausing to listen for signs of their opponents.
It was at the ninth rest stop that those sounds began to be heard, at least by K'da ears. From that point on, they walked quietly instead of running.
There was no conversation. There was no need for any. Jack might not have K'da military training, but he knew all about sneaking through hostile territory trying not to be noticed.
They had gone another ten minutes, and Jack had just about gotten his breath back from that mad dash, when Draycos abruptly came to a halt. Jack froze in place beside him, listening hard.
For a moment there was nothing. Then, from somewhere ahead, he heard it: a quiet voice, two more acknowledging voices, and then a faint crackle of leaves. Slowly, the crunching sounds moved off.
"Careful," he whispered into Draycos's ear as the sounds faded away. "They might have left a guard behind."
The dragon's tongue flicked out twice, tasting the air. "No," he whispered back. "All three have gone ahead. But others are moving up behind them."
Jack swallowed. Terrific. "What now?"
"We need information," Draycos said. "We must therefore set a trap. You spoke earlier of electronic detectors?"
Abruptly, belatedly, Jack remembered the slapstick at his side. "Oh, geez," he breathed, snatching it out of his belt like he'd suddenly found a snake riding his hip. "I wasn't even thinking."
"Calm yourself," Draycos assured him. "I allowed you to bring it because it may now be useful. Come."
He headed off at an angle. Gripping the slapstick in one hand and Draycos's tail in the other, Jack followed.
The dragon led him in a curving path, stopping at last beside a small tree with slender, multiple trunks poking out from a twisted root system. "Here," he said. "You may put the weapon down."
Jack obeyed. As he did so, something set between two of the thin trunks caught his eye. It was a small plastic object, shaped like a curved cone with a flat piece of glass or plastic on the side facing away from him. A thin metal rod connected it to one of the trunks, and he could see a double cable attached to the cone's pointy end hanging down to the ground.
And suddenly he realized what it was. "That's one of the Argus eyes!"
"Yes," Draycos agreed. "Do not worry. We have come up behind it." He reached out a claw and deftly sliced one of the two cables near where it went into the cone. "At any rate, they cannot see from it now."
"Yes, but—" With an effort, Jack choked back his protest. If anyone had been looking at the monitor when Draycos cut the cable, he might just as well have sent up a flare announcing where they were. "Fine. What now?"
The dragon's jaws opened slightly. "Now," he said, "we find you a tree."
Jack blinked. "A tree?"
"One which will hide you, but which they will not expect you can climb," Draycos continued, looking around. "One which therefore they will not think to examine. Ah— there. Come."
He headed off toward a smooth-sided tree that showed a hint of a bush-like branch structure beginning about fifty feet up. Rather like a giant dandelion, Jack thought as they approached. "Hold tightly," Draycos ordered, leaping a few feet up onto the side of the tree and again wagging his tail into Jack's face.
Swallowing hard, Jack got a firm grip on the tail. Without seeming to even notice the extra weight, Draycos started to climb.
A minute later they had reached the branches. "This should conceal you well," Draycos decided, pushing aside one of the leafy branches with his forepaw.
"Yeah," Jack agreed. Actually, with the way the branches spread out in layers from the trunk, each layer perhaps three feet higher up on the trunk than the previous one, the setup was like a woody sort of hammock with an overhead canopy. A lot cozier than some of the places he'd hidden out over the years.
Provided, of course, you weren't afraid of heights. "Where are you going to be?"
Draycos turned head downward, again gripping the trunk with his claws. "As I said, I will be setting a trap," he said. "Wait here until I return."
He headed down. "Sure," Jack murmured. "Whatever you say."
CHAPTER 22
Jack had been trying his best, Draycos knew. And he'd done a remarkably good job, given his youth and inexperience. Draycos appreciated that well, and once again was reminded that he could travel far and long here in the Orion Arm without finding a better partner.
But for all his effort and willingness, the boy was not a warrior. And to be honest, that meant he couldn't help but be a certain amount of dead weight. Both for that reason, and of course for Jack's own safety, Draycos was glad to have the boy out of the way for the moment.
Now, he thought grimly as he moved down the tree trunk, their opponents would see what a poet-warrior of the K'da could do.
Or to be more precise, they wouldn't see it. If all went well, they wouldn't see a thing.
The first advance team was long gone by now, heading downslope toward the wreckage of the transport. But there were at least two more groups within earshot making their way stealthily through the forest. All of them human, Draycos decided as he tasted the air.
He didn't know why the Whinyard's Edge seemed to have few if any nonhumans among their ranks. But that curious fact would make this particular task easier. After nearly two months with Jack, human physical capabilities were a known quantity to him, and fairly easy to work into his strategy.
He made his way back to where he'd left the Argus sensor and Jack's slapstick. The sensor was fastened solidly into the tree, but a little digging with his claws and he soon had it free. Tucking the sensor and slapstick under his forearms, he headed back in the direction o
f the Kilo Seven outpost, trailing the sensor's twin cables behind him.
He had to pause three times along the way, curling around himself and freezing to complete motionlessness beneath a convenient bush or thicket, as he ran into more trios of searchers. He studied each group carefully as they passed, trying to decide if they were all merc foot soldiers or whether one of them might be the line commander he was seeking.
In each case, he concluded it was the former. Apparently, the commander was still somewhere in the rear, allowing his men time to neutralize any threats before moving out himself.
For their part, not surprisingly, none of the soldiers took any notice of him, despite whatever sensor equipment and night-vision devices they might be carrying. Intent upon locating a human fugitive, they had no interest in a motionless creature of an unfamiliar type.
Even with the stops, it took only a few minutes for him to reach the sentry cage Jack had been manning earlier that night. No one was visible there, and for a few seconds he studied the area from cover, mentally putting the final touches on his plans. Then, tasting the air once more to confirm that no one was nearby, he set to work.
The first step was to replant the Argus sensor where it would be partially visible from the sentry cage. He found a good spot about fifty feet away to the south, half hidden beneath a bush. He wedged the metal mounting rod into the ground, leaving the sensor itself free to rotate. Then, leaving the slapstick beside it as bait, he began playing out the cable toward the sentry cage.
But not directly toward it. Twenty feet to the east of the tree that marked the cage was another of the puff-top trees like the one where he'd left Jack. Dropping his end of the twin cables near the base, he crossed to the cage and sliced the cables at that end. The two cables, he had already noted, were held only loosely together by a series of connector loops. Gripping the monitor end of both cables in his jaws, he climbed up into the puff-top tree.
Earlier, he had cut the sensor cable where it entered the Argus eye. Now, careful not to let it get hung up, he pulled the sensor cable completely through the connectors, freeing it from the control cable and coiling it up as it came. When the far end finally came free, he had a coil of over two hundred fifty feet.