The Planet Thieves by Dan Krokos

Author:Dan Krokos
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

Chapter Nineteen

Long, wailing screams that rattled Mason’s eardrums. Real tears welled and spilled from her eyes, and she rocked side to side, shaking her head all around. “My leg!” she screamed. “MY LEG! HEEEELLP!”

It took ten seconds, but the door to the bridge hissed open. Two Tremist marched out with talons. Mason ducked back into the doorway, then peeked around the corner with one eye.

“Quiet!” one shouted. “Quiet or I’ll blast you!”

Willa stopped screaming and rolled onto her side. “It hurts! They left me they left me!”

“Where are the others?” one said.

Mason wanted to yell, “Right here!” but they were facing away from him at the moment, and throwing away that advantage would be foolish. So he just stepped out from behind cover, raised his hands, and fired off a volley from both weapons. The glove only required a thought and the P-cannon a squeeze of his finger. Merrin was right beside him, doing the same thing. Violet lightning crackled down the hallway, narrow and precise, until the Tremist were on the ground, convulsing next to Willa.

“Now!” Mason said.

Willa sprang upright, and behind her the thirteen other cadets burst through the doorway, P-cannons at the ready. Mason led the charge into the bridge, where the six Tremist remained. They froze. Mason wanted to laugh. The sight of that many ESC cadets pouring into the room, automatically using the various consoles for cover, had to be startling. In four seconds the cadets were well covered, with sixteen guns pointed at the Tremist, not counting the two Rhadgast gloves.

Not a weapon was fired. The Tremist didn’t raise their talons with that much firepower pointed at them, and the cadets didn’t want to risk damaging the equipment. Mason could tell the Tremist feared the Rhadgast gloves from the subtle way they shifted and stared. The talons were superior to P-cannons, sure, but the cadets already had line of sight. Outside the dome, space crawled by, the black punctuated with dazzling white pinpricks. The Coffey system’s sun glowed like a hot marble millions of miles away, and the large green planet of Nori-Blue dominated the front view. It was so beautiful, Mason had to work hard not to look, to keep his eyes on the targets.

“Hands where I can see them,” Mason said, trying to keep the grin out of his voice; it wasn’t too difficult when he remembered the hard part was just beginning.

He and Merrin kept their gloved palms pointed toward the Tremist as the cadets slowly circled around from behind. Mason watched carefully, tense, as the cadets slapped locking bracelets on all the Tremist, then forced them into kneeling positions.

Willa and another fifth year, Terrence, went to rip their helmets off, but Mason said, “No,” and they stopped. He didn’t want the crew to see their purple hair and too-pale skin. Merrin didn’t deserve their suspicion, and it would only make their jobs harder. She seemed to recognize the danger of being revealed and bit her lower lip. She mouthed the word thanks at Mason, and he nodded discreetly.

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