Which meant it was like the ship destroyed after Parn had been attacked, as well as during the Caruson’s attack of Garmen, and a number of other incidences.
And every one pointed to a Cores and Caruso plot.
Shit.
She looked out the window and saw the mountains below them, green and gray in the last light of the day.
Ethan set his comms unit down.
“Are your people all right?” Velda asked.
He nodded. “Ed, Wren and Bailey were checking out the third ship of four that the military found trying to break out of line and head away from Aponi, when they were attacked. But ship number four, which they hadn’t gotten to yet, was destroyed first. Wiped out of existence.”
“So whatever it was we needed to find was probably on ship four,” Velda said.
“It definitely was. They’d already found the contraband in ship three when they were hit. The captain was smuggling weapons to Faldine.” Ethan looked down at the mountains, and checked the console in front of him.
“And the attacking ship used the freighters as cover, I hear.” Velda realized they . . . she . . . hadn’t expected such a violent and aggressive response from their adversaries.
“My people say it vanished when it realized it couldn’t hit ship three because one of the battleships was physically shielding it, and the other battleship was headed to the other side of the freighter line to confront them.”
“So we don’t know what was in ship four, but the silver lining is that whateverwasin there is no longer coming in to Aponi.”It was something, Velda thought. Not the best outcome, but at least they had disrupted their enemies’ plans.
Ethan gave a snort. “That’s a nice, positive spin.”
She glanced at him, ready to respond, when light seemed to blossom in front of her, blinding her momentarily.
The hover jerked hard to the left, falling downward with her window facing the ground, so she stared in wonder and horror as the mountains below her came into clear focus.
The hover jerked again, and she was pushed back into her seat, the hover more or less back to level.
She turned to Ethan, found him fighting with the controls. He’d clearly switched to manual mode, and he was half hunched over the console.
Neither of them were wearing their safety harness, and she pushed herself to her feet, grabbed his, and clipped him in from behind so he didn’t need to lift his hands from the controls.
Then she sat and clipped herself in, looking down at her comms unit to see if she could send out a signal, but it was showing no connection.
Whatever had hit the hover had taken out the comms functionality, she guessed.
The hover was buffeted by the winds as they got lower, shuddering and wobbling side to side as they came down too fast and too steep.
“I’m riding the strong thermals rising up from the mountains, but as soon as we get lower, I’ll lose that, and we are going to come down hard.” Ethan glanced at her for a moment, then swung his focus back on the controls. “Hold on tight.”
The ground came up fast.
Velda had an impression of forests, and then a wide, pebble-lined river, and Ethan directed the hover to the middle of it.
They hit the water with a boom of sound and it threw up a massive wave that swamped them. She could feel the hoverfighting, moving left and right, and the grating of metal as the bottom of the runner scraped over large rocks.
Finally, they slammed into a large rock on the left side, and Velda felt the harness cut into her shoulders. The hover spun right, turning them completely around, and then finally sank down onto the left bank.
For a moment, they sat in silence, and Velda heard the rush of water entering the hover from a rip in the side.
Right now, she didn’t care. They were alive, and more or less unharmed.
“We need to move. Leave everything.” Ethan stood, but she noticed he needed to steady himself on the console. “I can’t believe they didn’t take a second shot at us while we were coming down. They must have realized they hadn’t destroyed us.”
She hadn’t even thought of that. She gaped at him. “You think they’ll try again now?” She forced herself to her feet.
