“What happened?” Yiko demanded.
“It tried to pick up the Class 5 frame below, to lift it into nearspace, and some of the cables snapped off.” Hal remembered Eazi telling him the cables detaching could cause theUnhilto become destabilized, but he thought the ship would be moving erratically in nearspace at most.
This was a catastrophe.
“Can we work out where it’s going to land?” he asked.
Yiko had brought her portable screen up with her and she was inputting numbers, fingers flying.
“Not on the amphitheater,” Yiko said. “But close enough that the impact could cause damage. That base was already a damaged structure from when Eazi blew it up. A second massive hit might cause it to collapse.”
“What is it?” Chel asked, and Hal realized he was standing, legs braced, arms out, hands fisted.
“Fee is down there. Being held a prisoner in that base.” He had forgotten that none of them knew that. The conversations had been between him and Eazi, and when it came to Fee and his crew, he kept that kind of information to himself.
“Hal.” Voa’s voice was filled with horror. “What can we do?”
“She’s not a prisoner anymore,” Eazi said. “She’s outside, but it’s not necessarily safer for her.”
Hal tilted his head to the side. “Eazi says she got herself out. Where is she exactly?” he demanded.
The screen of his ship blinked and suddenly they were looking at aerial footage of Fee, standing on a sand dune, eyes shielded as she looked at the falling battleship, a wind blowing her hair back in a long dark ribbon.
“What’s that next to her?” Gerbardi asked.
Hal forced himself to shift focus and look for himself. Went absolutely still. “Eazi, I thought the Fitali said it was dead.”
“It appears not. And Fee has made friends with it. It’s saved her twice already.” Eazi’s voice was in his ear, for him alone.
“That’s a classified Fitalian secret, and no one here saw anything, all right?” Hal took a step closer to the screen as something moved sinuously through the sand.
“A frien?” he asked.
“Bunny,” Eazi said, and the whole bridge gasped in shock as the glittering metal segmented horror that was Bunny wound its way up Fee’s leg, clambered up her back, and then perched on her shoulder.
“There’s something about her,” Gerbardi said. “She attracts monsters.”
“Call me a monster, then,” Hal said. “And get a runner ready. I’m going down.”
CHAPTER 42
“You need to move away.”Eazi’s voice was urgent in her ear. “When theUnhilimpacts the ground, it could cause the amphitheater to collapse.”
Fee held out a hand for the grahudi as she turned, but it didn’t take it, although it did move with her.
She ran down the dune, and then out toward the downed runner, and the grahudi kept up with her easily.
The boom as theUnhilsmashed into the ground deafened her, and she was lifted off her feet and thrown.
She landed hard and rolled, grateful that it was sand and not a less giving surface, and when she sat up, she checked for the grahudi, and found it crouched beside her, gaze on the fireworks on the horizon.
The sun had almost set, and the explosion was long and ongoing, probably numerous smaller ones detonating one after the other.
Fee got carefully to her feet, wincing a little as she straightened up.
She hoped the crew of theUnhilhad been able to get out before the ship went down, because she couldn’t see how there would be any survivors after the impact.
Something moved high above her, and she saw two massive ships arrive.
