“It should move another thou or so to the south east in the next half a day, and then it’s lift-off time.” Vira turned to study the Class 5’s frame, and Fee did as well.
“How did you come up with the idea to lift it with a battleship?” Fee asked.
“The Tecran used this same method when they built the Class 5s.” Vira shaded her eyes and looked in the direction of Kyber’s Arm.
“Right.” Fee wondered if the Tecran had left out some vital information regarding this whole maneuver, because she still couldn’t see how it would work. “I’ll be very interested to watch. This is once in a lifetime stuff.”
“Yes.” Vira glanced at her, as if to see if she was poking fun, but when she saw Fee was being serious, she gave a nod. “It should work, and it’ll probably happen again with the next one we build.”
“Where are you going to get another thinking system?” Fee asked.
“Maybe we won’t need one,” Vira said.
“Maybe.” Fee shrugged. She had wondered if they’d try to build the ship without a thinking system. It seemed like they were thinking of going down that path with build number two.
What she hadn’t mentioned to Nukolo when they were talking about how Eazi had been contained on his Class 5 was that Eazi had had over a year of freedom since his ship had been destroyed. He was not the newly-formed consciousness he’d been before. There would be no containing him. No matter what they did.
Not that they had him, anyway, so it was all moot.
But still . . .
Could they be any more overconfident?
Suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, a shadow fell across them, and when Fee turned to look behind her and up, she saw a massive battleship hovering above. While it looked very high up, she guessed it was sitting as close to the planet’s surface as nearspace allowed.
“What are they doing here now?” Vira’s face was slack with astonishment.
As she spoke, runners dropped from the ship, and when they got closer, Fee was able to make out cables trailing behind them.
A shout came from the building cabin, and when she turned to look she saw Nukolo running toward them.
He was panting with exertion when he reached them. “The Grih are looking for theUnhil. Somehow, they know it’s in the vicinity. The Garmman have let me know they’ve had to move up the timeline, and Kyber’s Arm is fortunately far enough away to make the risk worth it. They have to do it now, or retreat to Garmman airspace and try another day.”
“Are they ready?” Vira asked.
“They say yes.” Nukolo looked up, and shook his head. “Incredible. This is going to be amazing.” Then he turned and ran toward the ship’s frame, waving his arms and shouting to the Balcoans working on it.
Fee felt Bunny drop down from his perch on the small of her back, landing behind her, and she just caught a glimpse of him racing toward the ship’s skeleton.
What was he up to?
The runners from the battleship were even closer now, eight of them, one for each of the curved metal girders making up the frame of the Class 5. As they dropped down, the noise they made was deafening.
They all hovered over the amphitheater and released the cables they’d shepherded down.
Nukolo was shouting orders, and while some of the workers grabbed equipment and harnesses and cleared them off the frame, others made their way to the top of each of the circular spaceship’s ribs.
Some had to use small hovers to grab hold of the cable meant for their section, others only needed to use a hook to grab the cable and pull it toward them.
They attached the ends, and Fee could hear the whole ship creak as the wind whipped the cables.
The battleship probably had a way to stay steady, hovering an eye watering height above them, and the shadow it cast seemed to lengthen.
The skeleton rocked as the wind gusted, dislodging a few workers, who screamed as they fell and then let their harnesses take them to the ground.
“It’s getting rough,” Bart said. “And this isn’t the well-planned attempt I was thinking. It’s too rushed.”
“They’ve done four trial runs on the simulator,” Vira said, waving a dismissive hand. “And watched how the Tecran did it, from the visual comms they recorded.” She glanced at Fee then tapped Bart’s arm. “You should take her back to her cell.”
