I managed to get a brief, fitful sleep, then, tired of tossing in my bunk, I got up and went to the com room, pushing my way though hordes of parts, pieces, and assorted junk. Truth was I didn’t know what most of this crap was. I wasn’t completely mallow ignorant, but tech controlled magical power sources weren’t really my forte. Of course Parry didn’t know much more than me, but still more. “Any luck?” I asked for the thousandth time. What could I say? I was bored.
“No,” Parry snapped. When he looked up from the recordstone tablet his thick, black hair was all disheveled. When he raised the binocular-like reader glasses his brown eyes were bloodshot and weary.
“Easy, bud,” I said holding up my hands. “Only asking.”
“I know,” Parry said in a huff and tossed his falla driver on the bench. Falla was a created element that was insulated against magical energy. “But I have no idea what I’m doing here.”
“Okay, take a break, get a drink, get some rest, try again in the morning.”
“Yeah,” he said and stood. He looked me straight in the eyes, which meant he was up on his toes; Parry wasn’t tall. “I’ll try again in the morning.” He gave my arm a squeeze. “And don’t worry, you can count on me,” he said and walked away.
“I’m not worried. You’ll get it,” I called to him. Frankly I knew he’d never get it. Magical encryptions have to be broken by a mage of equal skill, and I was certain that recordstone tablet had been locked by someone very powerful. But to keep my crew from going crazy I needed to keep them busy. Truth was I didn’t care what was in that file. Despite what I’d lead the others to believe, I did have a plan. It was just one that I wouldn’t be returning from so for now, it was busy work one and all.
“There you are,” DJ said coming down the narrow hall at a fast pace. “Uncle’s back.”
“Where?”
She shifted her eyes to the corners of their sockets like she was looking back behind herself. More likely she was avoiding my eyes which meant bad news. “In the mess.”
I walked to the mess; DJ stayed tight on my heels. Uncle was seated at the long table. He was covered head to toe in grease, soot, and some gooey green gunk. He had a mug of steaming caffeine syrup in front of him.
“So?” I asked standing at the head of the table.
He wiped at his sweaty forehead with a rag from his pocket, but only spread more gunk on himself with the filthy rag. Then he took a long sip from the mug. Looked like he was avoiding giving me the news and by his expression he looked none too happy about delivering it. “He was shot up pretty good, meaning bad. Not high caliber stuff, but he took a lot of rounds.”
“So not the Kriskrossa,” I said. “Enforcer corps or gangsters then.”
“Not the corps,” Uncle said, staring into his mug. “They were here, didn’t have any idea what happened to Ship. Asked about you. I told them you and Ship were no longer an item.” Uncle searched his rag for a clean spot. He didn’t find one but he blew his nose on it anyway. He was stalling. I never knew Uncle to mince words so I sat down. “They wanted to take Ship directly to the smelting pot and they seemed eager to be done with it.”
“So why didn’t they?” I asked. “What aren’t you telling me?”
He looked deep into my eyes and said, “Ship’s dead.”
“No,” DJ said and dropped into the chair beside him. Her eyes were already growing moist. “How?”
“Hold on,” I said wanting to tame the rising emotional tide. Ship was already essentially dead, I knew because I’d essentially killed him, and I seriously doubted anyone could have killed him the rest of the way. “When you say he’s dead, do you mean you can’t fix him?”
“Oh, it’ll fly just fine. I already repaired most of the mechanical damage, but that’s it, it’s just a machine again, he’s gone.”
“Oh no,” DJ said and a pair of tears left her eyes and trickled down her cheeks. I had no idea she’d been so attached to that cantankerous hover demon.
But I had good reason to doubt Uncle’s assessment. “You’re being very unspecific. What makes you say he’s gone?”
“Well there’s the obvious, like he’s not complaining, crying, threatening, or generally talking at all. The system recorder shows data from your dogfight with the Cranks, shows Ship dropping you off at the edge of the outlands, near the Grand Nitsburg Hotel, and then there’s a big blank spot until he’s overhead here, damaged and crashing.”
“That’s not possible,” DJ said. “No one can override a flight recorder’s records; they’re encrypted directly into the sub-dimensional storage realm.”
Uncle and I met an uncomfortable gaze before I said, “Uncle can.”
DJ’s eyes grew wide in surprise and she opened her moth to speak, so I spoke first.
“Did you check if the crystal’s still there?”
“It’s there,” he said nodding. “But its gone dark.”
I shook my head. “That’s an ausite spirit crystal, no one can draw the spirit from it without the key or another splinter and there are no splinters and no one knows where that key is but me. It’s impossible.”
“So is altering magically encrypted flight data, but Uncle can,” DJ said looking smug.
She had a point.
“Stay here,” I said and headed up to the garage.