“This isn’t exactly a low-tech facility.” He unzipped a pocket, pulled out his netdisc, and brought up a holodisplay showing the blueprints. “I think there may be a forcefield in addition to the wall around the compound.” He waved a finger through the display to point at things, highlighting them in blue as he did so. “Did you see this? And this, this, and this? Also, our sensors picked up drones flying around over everything.” Two dozen more highlights appeared, little dots moving above the facility.
“What’s your point?” Jelena asked, though she suspected she knew. Any thoughts she’d had of simply riding up and snipping some barbed wire to get in were being quashed.
“This place is secure. Very secure.”
“That’s why I invited you to come along.”
“Invited, right. I believe the word is manipulated.”
“I’m glad they had vocabulary classes at that fancy university you attended. Look, you’ve disabled ships’ shields from a distance before. What’s a little forcefield? Can’t you break their generator?”
Erick shifted on his bike, looking up and down the canyon and back at the Snapper, its bulky, green turtle-shaped outline almost invisible against the backdrop of the dark cliff behind it. Nobody would call the craft sleek, and it wouldn’t win any races, but she loved that it, if one used one’s imagination, looked like an animal. Erick had pointed out numerous other freighters in the price range her parents had been looking at, but after they’d helped the previous owner out of a jam, and the Snapper had become available, Jelena had fought hard for it. The ship had soul.
“Did you look up what the company does?” Erick asked quietly, apparently not thinking of the Snapper.
“Of course I did. They grow human organs from stem cells and sell them to medical facilities for transplants. There’s absolutely no reason they need to experiment on animals for that.”
“You’re not a scientist. You don’t know that. They could be working on some other things, too, other things to help people.”
“You’re not backing out on me, are you?”
He sighed. “No. If those pictures were true, then I don’t disagree with you on this, but if the company is doing something good for sick people, well, just don’t forget that, huh? Maybe their methods could be better, but if the ultimate outcome saves lives . . .”
“I’m sure they make a lot of money selling those organs, I doubt anyone here is altruistic. If they were good people, they wouldn’t treat the animals that way. And from what the guard said, they don’t treat their human workers that well either.”
He shook his head slowly, his expression bleak behind his faceplate.
Jelena tried not to feel affronted by his doubt, but she knew he wouldn’t be questioning her mother or Leonidas if they’d decided on this mission. More likely, he’d be asking if he could help blow things up. For someone who liked to create and fix things, his green eyes gleamed like wet emeralds in the sun when he got a chance to fire weapons or light explosives.
Trying to sound encouraging, she leaned over and gripped his shoulder. “Come on, Erick. We can do this. We’re Starseers. Practically superheroes.”
“Superheroes? Do you still wear that underwear with the ponies on it?”
“That’s none of your business. And they’re unicorns.”
He snorted.
“That reminds me,” she said, waving toward his torso, “are you wearing your pajamas under your spacesuit or did you change into something a little fiercer?” She imagined their foes throwing back their heads and laughing if they were caught and stripped of their suits for an interrogation.
“Fiercer? Like what? Should I have added a cape? And a sword?”
“A sword? Who carries around swords anymore?” She waved at his staff, similar to hers, in its holder behind him. “That’s the appropriate weapon for a Starseer.”
“Glad to hear it.”
She noticed he hadn’t denied having the pajamas on underneath his suit. Ah, well. They would just have to avoid being caught and interrogated.
“Are you ready?” she asked.
“Yes.” He patted a toolbox he’d attached to his bike.
“Good.” She started to urge her bike into movement, but paused. “Thanks for coming with me, Erick.”
He truly had no reason to go along with her whims, other than the fact that he worked for her parents. Since her mom was the captain of the Star Nomad and co-owner of the business, Erick was used to obeying her orders, but it wasn’t as if that power transferred down to Jelena. He’d been like a big brother to her ever since he’d first come aboard the ship to train with Grandpa, tolerating games far too young for him because she’d been the closest person to his age aboard, even if he would have preferred spending time with Uncle Tommy or Abelardus, the Starseer who’d lived with them for a time. But those two had moved on eventually, and Jelena and Erick had become closer after that.
She liked having a big brother, especially since he still played games and had a goofy streak, though she sometimes wondered what it would have been like if Thorian—once Prince Thorian—had stayed aboard the ship too. Only two years apart in age, they had become playmates and best friends after her biological father had died and during the time she had been separated from her mother. Unfortunately, after Grandpa’s crazy brother had been defeated, Thor had gone off with Dr. Dominguez and those secretive Starseers who wanted to use him to bring the empire back. In the beginning, her family had visited, and she’d kept in touch with Thor, but she hadn’t heard from him in the last four years, and she had no idea what he was doing these days.
“You’re welcome,” Erick said. “Don’t get us killed.”
“I didn’t get us killed during any of our years of childhood adventures, did I?”
“No, but I have scars.”
“Most people can’t get a scar from a pillow.”
“A pillow thrown by an android might as well be a rock.”
“Moonpuff.”
She grinned at him and drove her thrust bike toward the edge, tilting it upward as she flew off. The thruster power increased, the seat thrumming beneath her, and the nose rose toward the starry sky and the top of the canyon.
Erick zoomed past her, zigzagging like a drunk in a race.
“You think I’m going to be the one to get us killed?” she asked, worried he would lose the hoverboards and their loads. She imagined the inflatable pods pitching over the side and crashing to the canyon floor. Though it would be a slow crash, since the moon claimed only twenty percent of standard gravity.
“Just testing to make sure everything is attached securely.” He waved back at her and continued weaving and zigzagging until he reached the top of the canyon. All that being mature and adult when commenting on her plans must have been wearing at him.
He did wait for her at the top, and they flew across the pockmarked moon side by side. From above, the craters hadn’t appeared so large, but now as they rode around and over them, they made the bikes seem small, their riders miniscule.
Jelena tried not to feel insignificant underneath the millions of stars glittering in the black sky all around them. She also tried not to think about the lack of air outside, even though the text and graphs that ran down the sides of her helmet’s liquid Glastica display reminded her of it. Unlike with combat armor, these suits couldn’t stand up to anything like bullets or blazer fire. If they were punctured, she and Erick would be in trouble. Superheroes, she’d jokingly called them. Yes, they had some mental powers that most people didn’t, but they were just as vulnerable to death as any human being.
“We’re probably visible to their sensors,” Erick said as they flew closer, the black wall around the compound coming into view.
“Can you break them?”
He’d broken enemy ships’ systems from a distance before, often to help the Nomad escape pirates or competitors who weren’t above ruthless tactics. Running freight between planets and moons that were solidly under Alliance control wa
s usually a safe proposition, but once one flew farther from the core worlds, the system grew much dicier. The pay for running freight out there could be impressive, too, and Mom and Leonidas weren’t too conservative to be tempted from time to time. After all, Grandpa was a powerful Starseer who could often convince enemies to leave them alone. And if that didn’t work, Leonidas would happily engage in combat with anyone who tried to board the Nomad. He might be fifty now, but he still had all his cyborg implants, and he could put fists through walls—or skulls.
“If I had a lot more time to study the facility, I probably could,” Erick said, his helmet swiveling toward her.
From her angle, Jelena couldn’t see his eyes through the faceplate, but she could imagine the reproof in his gaze. She should have given him the blueprint and told him about everything earlier, but she’d been worried that, with more time to think about it, he would grow certain that he needed to tell her parents. He’d almost told them, as it was.
“Maybe they’ll think we’re tourists.”
“Tourists cruising across their private property.”
“I didn’t say we were conscientious tourists. Let’s keep going and be prepared to improvise. If we have to, we can abort.” Temporarily, Jelena added silently. If they found out they were outmatched, she would take what they learned and come up with a more sophisticated plan. She admitted being a little daunted by all of the security measures Erick had found. She hadn’t expected a laboratory to be equipped like some medieval Earth fortress poised on a contested border.
“All right,” Erick said. “Your animals are being kept near the outside of the compound, aren’t they?”
Jelena nodded. “In a warehouse on the southwest corner.” She didn’t add, according to my source. She didn’t want to give Erick another reason to worry, but all of the information they had could be false. The Stellacor people could have even planted it, though she couldn’t imagine why they would want to lure animal crusaders down to their facility.
The walls seemed to loom taller and taller as they sailed closer on their bikes. Jelena wished there were some mountains or boulders to hide their approach. Even though the moon was dark, with the only lights clustered around the facility, she felt vulnerable and exposed. And—she frowned as something twanged at her senses—she felt something ahead of them.
“I thought so.” Erick slowed down his bike. “Forcefield.”
Jelena couldn’t see anything, but she could feel it. An invisible dome covering the compound.
Erick would have to handle it. She had no way of lowering a forcefield unless she knew where the button was and could find some animal inside that she could telepathically convince to push it. Technically, she could speak telepathically with people, too, but she found touching the minds of strangers extremely uncomfortable and usually reserved that intimacy for close friends and family. Besides, Grandpa had always emphasized that using one’s talents to manipulate people was ethically questionable, unless it was clear those people were enemies and dangerous.
Erick lowered his bike to the ground and planted his boots on either side of it. His helmet drooped toward his chest. “I’ll try to trace the power to its source and see if I can figure out where the on/off switch is.”
“Good. Thanks.” Jelena wouldn’t have the foggiest idea how to do that.
She shifted in her seat while she waited, feeling useless. And even more vulnerable than before. Now that they were closer, she could sense with her mind the drones. They were zipping about on patrol routes, cameras recording footage around the compound. What would she do if guards were sent out to tell them to leave? Or to force them to leave?
She looked toward the southwest corner of the compound. From her position, she couldn’t see anything except the wall, but she concentrated on sensing life on the other side. She struggled to see inanimate objects with her mind, but she had no trouble detecting the bodies of living, breathing creatures, human and otherwise. They were close enough now that she could brush against the awareness of many animals, and she lifted her head like a hound catching the scent. She’d found the warehouse. The information hadn’t been false.
“They’re there,” she whispered, looking toward Erick.
“Who? Guards?”
“The animals. They’re where they’re supposed to be.” Jelena could tell that most of them were sleeping, but a few were awake, and she sensed their discomfort and how some of them were in pain. She blinked before tears could form—she wouldn’t be able to wipe them while she wore the helmet.
“Ah.” He sounded distracted. He was probably still tracing the forcefield to its source.
“All we have to do is get through the forcefield, over the wall, and break into that building.”
“All.”
Jelena concentrated on that area again, trying to sense if there were any human guards in there with the animals. She brushed the mind of a dog and lingered because it started, sensing her distant touch. She shared soothing feelings with it, even as she grimaced because she could feel its discomfort in its cage.
Her cage, she corrected, getting more of a sense for the dog. Of the sores on her body, the hunger gnawing at her stomach, the bewilderment at being kept in this dark place, the fear of when she was taken out into the light, to other rooms in the facility, to places that would bring more pain—
“Jelena?” Erick touched her arm, and she flinched.
“Yes,” she said.
“Stay with me here. There are people awake in there, and I think someone might have noticed us.”
“It’s dark in the warehouse with the animals. I don’t think anyone is there with them.”
Yellow flashed in front of them, and they both jerked back. For a second, the outline of the forcefield was visible to the eye, the dome covering the entire facility, from the ground to above the two towers near the center of the compound.
“Did you cause that?” Jelena asked when darkness returned.
“No, I hadn’t touched anything yet. There’s not a simple on/off switch. It’s a software program. I could possibly destroy the generator and the forcefield altogether, but I don’t think we want to make enemies here—or alert them to our presence so soon.”
“Are you sure you didn’t trip something?” Jelena eyed the top of the wall facing toward them, imagining a parapet that people could walk along and shoot from.
“Positive. It could have just been—” His helmet tilted.
Not certain why he’d stopped, Jelena opened her mouth to ask, but she realized the sensation she’d felt earlier was gone.
“It’s down,” Erick said, turning his bike’s thrusters on again, the stack of hoverboards flowing after him.
Jelena nudged her bike forward, too, though wariness made her hesitant to roar forward at full speed. “It just went down? You didn’t do that?”
“It wasn’t me. It’s probably for them.” He pointed toward the stars.
It took Jelena a moment to spot lights against the starry sky, a ship approaching. For an alarmed moment, she thought her parents might have found out what she was up to and that the Nomad was coming to get them. But the facility wouldn’t have dropped their forcefield for some strange freighter.
“Late for a delivery or a pickup,” she mused, then gunned her thrusters when she realized Erick was rapidly pulling away from her. She didn’t want to miss her chance to get to the wall before the forcefield was turned back on.
“Maybe their crew didn’t feel like diverting for illicit activity,” Erick said without looking back. He seemed determined to get to the wall before that ship arrived.
“You were more polite and less sarcastic before you went away to school,” Jelena said, alternating between watching the approach of the ship and the terrain as she flew over it. “And I thought we discussed that we couldn’t possibly be doing something illicit in a place where there aren’t any laws.”
“I mostly remember discussing swords and capes. And ponies and unicorns.” He reached the
wall and paused, looking up. Considering flying over? That would be simpler than cutting—or blowing—a hole.
“Because I’m a good friend, I’ll do you a favor and not tell any women you date that you can’t keep from thinking about my underwear.”
“Should I ever find someone to date me, I’m sure I’ll be grateful.”
“Didn’t you tell Leonidas you were meeting a girl in Gizmoshi after we dropped off the cargo? You specifically asked if we could spend the night there.”
“I am supposed to meet someone, but it’s not for a date. It’s a couple of crew mates from Striker Odyssey. We’re going to have a beer at a pub, link our netdiscs, and practice some maneuvers so we can kick the Elder Squadron’s butts the next time we’re in the combat arena.”
Jelena digested this as she caught up with him at the base of the wall. “You told my dad you have a date when you’re going to meet a bunch of gamers?”
“I didn’t want him to think I was . . . uhm. Well, you know he’s not impressed by games.”
“He’s not impressed by my horse obsession, either, but he still loves me.”
“You’re his stepdaughter. If he didn’t love you, your mom would kick him in the asteroids.”
“True, but I don’t think you have to lie to him about women.”
“It’s not any worse than lying to him about secret side missions.”
“I haven’t lied about anything.” Jelena pointed to the top of the wall. “Let’s try going over. Maybe their arriving ship will keep them distracted.”
“I wish that were true,” Erick said, looking past her toward the corner of the wall.
Two men with blazer rifles were running toward them, taking huge bounds in the moon’s low gravity. Startled because they weren’t wearing spacesuits, Jelena gaped at them, but then she realized that the bland, emotionless faces belonged to androids. Androids who, judging by the way they slung those rifles toward Jelena and Erick, had orders to kill them.
Chapter 2
Jelena grabbed her staff from its holster as she parked and hopped off her thrust bike. She was tempted to use the vehicle as a shield, but didn’t want it damaged—they had to haul rescued dogs away with that bike, damn it. Besides, she didn’t have a Starseer staff for no reason.