“A lot.” Jessica’s forehead wrinkled. “Maybe too much.”
Talon asked, “You think it is a trap?”
“No, but…but maybe.”
He gave her a long glance. She wore a pensive expression. She said, “I think I am jumping at shadows. The whole thing is stupid, you know. We should likely call it off.”
“True.”
She drew a breath. The breath lifted her chest in an enticing way, and he had to turn his eyes away to stop staring at that magnificent physique of hers.
She said, “Oh look, it was slowing down for…” Her mouth opened and closed. A frown came and went, but he had seen it too. He spoke softly. “It’s a cloaked ship!”
Her words held worry. “It is a Gorlite ship, and Talon, look!”
Talon had already seen it. So had Harlon and several other crewmembers. They crowded around the windows, all of them watching but not speaking.
Talon could not believe what he was seeing, but he was seeing it anyway.
The Federation ship had slowed down and the Gorlites, rather than trying to take the ship, were standing down.
Harlon spoke up. “Boss, they are refueling the Gorlite ship!”
“I see that.” Of course he did. How could he not?
Talon scowled at the ships. He dropped his ship back and raised the cloaking devices before ducking the ship behind a small ripple in the warp around the system they were riding through.
It would not be enough if they had already been spotted though. His eyes narrowed again as he jockeyed the ship into a better position so he could see the ships.
Refuel and resupply.
Why in the hell would a federation ship be supplying a Gorlite ship?
The Federation shunned the creatures and had outlawed them from planet surfaces, not that there were many planets that would suit the creature’s bug-like bodies and burrowing habits. The race was homeless; they lived on ships they took and then used until it was ruined and no longer able to sustain them, and then they took another.
They had destroyed many a planet before the Federation outlawed and hunted them to the ends of the universe and back. They had been harried into near-extinction, but they were far from dead, and now he was watching a Federation ship give supplies to a Gorlite ship.
It was always easy to spot a Gorlite ship. The creatures secreted a slime that encased everything and eventually caused a particular type of damage to the hulls of the ships that they took. It was part of the reason that they had to always take new ships; their own bodies ate their home.
Harlon said, “We cannot take that ship. Hell, if we did there would be precious little to take. It looks like the Gorlites are getting it all, and we all know once it hits a Gorlite deck it’s not anything anyone would want.”
Jessica’s teeth worried at her lip. Her lovely eyes met his, and he saw a question written largely in her eyes. He said, “I need to know what is happening here. I do.”
He did. There was no way that could be happening, but it was.
He watched as the Federation ship took up its fuel and supply lines and the Gorlite ship headed off. He said, “The rest of the fleet is far ahead now.”
Harlon asked, “You can’t be serious; you still want to take that ship?”
“Damn right, but now what I want off of it is information.”
Harlon shook his head. “You got all the info you need, boss. It was supplying a Gorlite ship, you saw it. We all saw it.”
Talon’s ire notched higher. “Yes, we did. Now I want to know why.”
Harlon whistled through his teeth. He rubbed a hand over his head. “I will admit to being curious.”
Talon grinned. The grudging words meant one thing: Harlon hated the Gorlites and the Federation as much as he did. As much as every single being on that ship did. He said, “We take the ship. Now. Before it can catch up and before any more Gorlites can show up to get supplies. We can’t fight two ships, especially if one is filled with Gorlites.”
