“A number of reasons. He’d hidden the fact of the Draell-nar’s existence and his exploitation of them, and he didn’t want word getting out. And we have also heard that he was taking bribes from Futuros, who wanted to hide the fact that they had continued with their cyborg experiments.”
“But you disobeyed him.” Rosamund felt pride swelling inside her at his bravery.
Kodran flashed a sardonic grin. “Technically, no. I did blow up the soldier-cyborgs’ ship…after we moved the Draell-nar and the soldier-cyborgs onto our own vessel. After that, my clan quickly relocated and began building our new city. Sekari always suspected that we’d betrayed him, and he made several surprise visits here, which is why we had to keep the Draell and the soldier-cyborgs hidden.”
“The cyborgs were injured months ago,” Temra said. “Why did you wait until now to buy the cyborg repair equipment?”
“We tried to treat them here, but they were dying. We had no choice but to go to Agora to buy the right equipment to fix them.” Kodran smiled fondly at Rosamund. “That is why I signed up at Starcrossed, as a cover for my being on Agora. And I am so glad that I did.”
“This is where a human would say ‘barf’,” Dot-R observed. She was apparently done recharging and seemed to be back to her sassy self.
“Are you telling us this because you are planning on killing us?” Temra asked grimly.
Kodran shook his head. “No, I am telling you this because I need your help. When the Federation ship comes, I need you to help cover for me. We will tell them that Sekari made false claims against us because he wanted revenge on us for secession, which he viewed as treachery.”
“Do the cyborgs have to run?” Rosamund wondered. “It seems so unfair. They didn’t ask for this. If they stayed and explained their case to the Federation…”
Kodran nodded in agreement. “It is not fair, but that does not matter to the Federation representatives. The Federation might let them live, or they might decide it’s just too dangerous and decommission them. I left it up to them, and they decided to flee. We’ve had a ship on standby for them in case this occasion ever came up.”
Temra limped over to the other Vulfans, and they began conferring in low voices. Finally he looked up and nodded to Kodran. “We will support you when the Federation ship arrives.”
A huge explosion sounded from the direction from which they’d just come.
“If we live that long,” Prenzal said. “It looks like Sekari isn’t going to wait for the Federation to get here and find out the truth.”
