ReDawn (Skyward, #2.2)(62)

“He’s going to want to parade you around at the Council tree,” I said to Jorgen. “You’re the hero of ReDawn now, apparently.”

Jorgen looked horrified, and I laughed.

“Hey,” Nedd said, coming up and slapping Jorgen on the back. “If you want, you can tell them I’m Jorgen Weight. I’ve always wanted to be in a parade.”

Jorgen looked like he might consider it. “We need to report to Cobb,” he said. “Tell Command we’ve been successful here. After that, hopefully we can go home. If I can talk some sense into my parents, maybe they’ll even send an official diplomatic coalition instead of a flight of pilots.”

Actual aid, and a renewal of our old alliance. I’d gone to the humans looking for help—but until this moment I don’t think I’d let myself believe help would actually come.

“Thank you,” I said to Jorgen, “for not abandoning my people to the Superiority when the inhibitor went down.”

    Jorgen looked confused. “Of course,” he said. “That’s what an alliance is. It means we protect each other.”

So many of my own people backed down at the first sign of inconvenience that I’d expected the same of the humans. They could have left and waited out whatever that ship would have done to Tower in retribution. They’d risked their own lives to save my people. They’d done it again and again.

I’d misjudged Jorgen. He was an incredible leader, and it was a privilege to fly with him.

“Yes,” I said. “That’s what an alliance is.”

Jorgen still looked confused, like this was so obvious it didn’t bear saying. “I’m going to try to reach Cobb on the hypercomm,” he said. “We need to warn them about what the Superiority almost did to the people who were supposedly working with them.” He ducked into the command center.

“I told you he wasn’t going to turn on you,” Arturo said. He leaned against the corridor wall, watching me.

“You did tell me that,” I said. “But you also said you thought I was going to turn on you.”

“I said I didn’t think you would,” Arturo said. “But that it was a possibility.”

“I seem to remember you being very threatening,” I returned. “And quite concerned.”

Arturo grinned. “Fine. Maybe neither of us is a perfect judge of character.”

“If I’d really believed you all weren’t trustworthy,” I said, “I never would have asked for your help to begin with.”

    “That’s probably true,” Arturo said. “Though did you have other options?”

“Not good ones,” I admitted. “So thank you.”

Arturo’s expression grew serious. “You shot down that other cytonic,” he said. “You knew him?”

I could still see Quilan’s face as he bore down on me, destructors firing.

“I did,” I said. “He was going to kill me, and I got him first.”

“Right,” Arturo said. “That seems like it should make it easier, doesn’t it? But I’ve never had to shoot down someone I talked to. Someone I knew.”

I wanted to say the world was better off without Quilan in it, but I wasn’t sure that was true. My people had so few cytonics. We needed every one.

Maybe Rinakin was right. There was a place for persuasion. Quilan’s death was a waste, of a leader as well as a cytonic. Killing him had been necessary, but everyone would have been better off if we could have persuaded him to change his mind to fight for our side.

Now he could never change his mind, and there was a kind of tragedy to that.

“I’m not glad he’s dead,” I said, “but I’m glad I’m still alive. I wish it had all gone differently, but I don’t know what I would have changed, or if I even had the power to change it.”

“You had the power to do something really good for your people and ours,” Arturo said. “Does that make it feel better?”

    I thought about that. “I don’t know,” I said. “But I don’t regret it, I know that.”

Arturo nodded. “Yeah. Neither do I.”

He held my gaze for a moment, and something about the way he looked at me was thrilling and terrifying all at once. I followed after Jorgen into the control room.

Rinakin was finishing his broadcast. He slumped against the control panel, looking exhausted. His daughter stood by his side, urging him to come rest in one of the bunk rooms.

“We need to get him medical attention,” she told me.

“I know,” I said. “If the Independence medic can’t care for him, we’ll take him to a hospital soon.” Rinakin’s injuries didn’t look life threatening, but he should still receive treatment.

Jorgen leaned against the wall by the hypercomm. The purple and orange slug from his ship was now in there, and he tapped his fingers on the control panel, waiting.

“Admiral Cobb will speak to you now,” someone said, and then Cobb spoke through the hypercomm.

“Jorgen,” he said. “It’s about time you reported in.”

Jorgen frowned. Cobb had told him not to call, hadn’t he? Because he was trying to stay in good with the politicians, and not let anyone know he was involved in Skyward Flight’s desertion.