Empress of a Thousand Skies(27)
“Eyes on the heat sensors!” But as soon as Vin said it, he swerved right and just missed a laser beam. A white royal cruiser was at their rear and gaining speed. It fired a second laser, but Vin ducked their pod beneath it effortlessly—the only pilot Aly knew who could pull that off. Vin shot him an irritated look, as if to say told you.
The cruiser was on their tail, and soon a second one joined it. But Vin didn’t seem afraid. He actually seemed kind of calm about the whole thing.
“Answer me, choirtoi.” Aly was losing it. “Or—”
“Or what?” Vin had to shout over the noise of the engine from the sentience systems. They went into a nosedive, then a barrel roll, avoiding the rapid fire that shot out from behind them. “Look, I’ve been working for the United Planets, okay?”
“The United Planets?” Aly asked. It wasn’t the answer he’d expected—not that he knew what to expect. The United Planets was a neutral organization that played peacemaker between all the planets. As far as Aly knew, members of the United Planets sat around in a circle and asked nicely for favors and spent most of their time voting on things. As in, they didn’t get taejis done.
“I was placed on the Revolutionary to gather intel on Kalu’s UniForce,” Vin said. “I wasn’t gaining any traction. Sometimes I forgot I was even a spy. But the United Planets made contact a few weeks back and said to keep an eye out, and that there might be an attempt on the Princess’s life. That pod we were chasing earlier—I had a bad feeling. So I tried to hail my contact. I was careful. But maybe someone got wise. Heard the message . . .”
“You chased down that pod like a maniac. You think that didn’t put us on someone’s radar?” Aly shouted. “Then you hail someone, and you want me to think you were being careful? You don’t even answer your cube—”
“I turned it off! They’re spying on us, Aly. I’ve been telling you for years to turn yours off too.”
“I thought you were just one of those naturalistic freaks!”
“It was a cover. I couldn’t be on DroneVision and start talking about conspiracy theories.”
Aly shook his head. “Are you for real?”
“Don’t even give me that look.” Vin pulled them into another nosedive. “Kalu has had the tech for decades. All those G-1K summits? You wouldn’t believe some of the shit they tried to do. You wouldn’t believe what they can do already. They can pull memories . . .”
“You’re talking straight-up crazy,” Aly said, but he was shaken. He remembered what the missionaries had warned: the horrible rumors about soul-sucking, mind-pulling, the evil that would destroy you. The Ravaging. “How long have you been working this side hustle?” Vin wouldn’t look at him, so he leaned forward and got in his face. “How long have you been playing spy for the United Planets? And don’t lie.”
“Since before boot camp,” Vin said after a pause. “Before I even knew you or Jeth or anyone else we trained with.”
He didn’t realize he’d bit down on his tongue until he could taste blood in his mouth. He thought they had come after him because he’d found the royal pod. But Vin figured it was because his message had been intercepted. Aly didn’t know which one was true. The timing might’ve been a coincidence.
Which meant there was a chance no one knew Princess Rhiannon might be alive. He’d keep that in his pocket for now. He wasn’t about to tell Vin, not when he’d held back so much for so long.
Vin was still talking, trying to tell him how it wasn’t all that big of a deal and everything was the same and that they were going to look out for each other. He was still spinning and dodging artillery like it was cake, notching up toward dangerous levels of interstellar speed like it wasn’t any kind of thing. “We have to get to Portiis. The Lancer will meet us to debrief, and until then we’ll be safe.”
“The Lancer?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know his real name. Safer that way.”
“In what universe is this safer?” They were headed toward a cluster of asteroids. Vin tilted the throttle so they squeezed, just barely, through a gap between two giant pieces of floating rock, and they zoomed in at an insane speed. Pieces of rock chipped off as their wings kissed the surface of the asteroids. One of the cruisers tried to follow, but the angle was off and it clipped its wing. Aly watched as it spun wildly, stark white against a sheet of black, before it receded and disappeared. Aly felt a brief burst of regret. He wondered if that pilot would survive. And if he didn’t, what would that make the body count today? Three? Four souls?
“I know it’s a lot to take in,” Vin said—but with irritation, as if Aly were the one being unreasonable. “You gotta trust me.”
“Oh yeah? And why should I do that?”
“I needed to keep my cover. I was doing recon!”
“Right. Recon.”
“I saved your life.”
“After you nearly got me killed,” Aly pointed out. “So what? You show up, to the rescue, with all this specialized training I never knew about. You tell me I gotta cut and run and leave everything behind. But you know what? I like my life. So just drop me off at the nearest station, and I’ll run over to the UniForce base and explain that I had nothing to do with your little spy game. I can just pretend this whole thing never happened.”