“Hit,” Craik said. “One of the big cargo bays in section six. Can’t tell the damage.”
The Confluence was already closing the breach doors.
“Weapons,” Ean sang to line eight. “What have you got?” Because he knew that’s what Sale would ask next.
He was swamped with the same overlay that had overwhelmed him before.
“We’re sitting ducks here,” Sale said. “Ean, I need weapons. And don’t give me that green protective field.”
Ean seized on the only one he recognized. “That one.” Quiet, blue, hot blood. “Sale, which ship do you want to aim at first?”
“Shit.” A two-second pause. “Hellfire.”
“Which one’s that?”
Another second while Sale oriented herself between human screen and alien displays. “That one.”
“That one,” Ean whispered. “Do it now. Do it quick.”
“I need weapons, Ean. I need them yesterday.”
“Coming.” But they were in the void, and he wasn’t sure if Sale heard him. Line eight released the weapon, then they were out again. A blue ball of flame engulfed Hellfire. Ean was ready for the metallic smell of hot blood that flooded the ship, but he still staggered. The lines on the Hellfire went dead.
“Shit. Was that you, Ean?”
“It was the ship.” Sale needed to learn what the ship was doing for her.
He took a moment to see what was happening on the station. Radko was taking forever to get to the shuttle bays.
The commander had stopped trying to call Jakob, stopped trying to get through the locked doors. He turned his attention to the Confluence. “Weapons, armed.” He didn’t have a full crew at the weapons bay, but he had enough to man and load them.
“Hellfire is no longer firing,” Craik said.
Hellfire was a dead ship. But the Brimstone was still firing.
“Nice shooting, Ean,” Sale said.
“You should compliment the ship.”
Sale looked at him, then said, “Thank you, ship,” but she turned back to Ean immediately.
“You should always thank the ship.”
“Right, I get the message. Now what do we do about the other ship, and how long is this one out for?”
“We can’t use the blue thing again. It takes time to recharge.”
“We need a miracle, Ean. We’re undermanned, we have no idea what this ship can do yet, and no one to do it for us.”
He couldn’t give her a miracle. “Hellfire won’t fire again, it’s dead. I don’t—”
“Perfect. Thank you. Open the comms to the bridge on the Brimstone.”
He sang the comms open for her.
“Brimstone,” Sale said. “This is the Confluence. We have destroyed the Hellfire. If you don’t want the same fate, cease fire now.”
Ean had just told her they couldn’t do it again yet. He turned his attention to the other problem, because the commander on the station had received a weapons ready from the gunners. He diverted the commander’s comms into the speakers in the corridor where Radko was.
“Gunnery one,” the commander said. “Fire a salvo in a three, two, five pattern. We’re not aiming to destroy the ship yet, only scare it.”
Chaudry stopped. “They’re firing at us.”
“No they’re not,” Radko said, barely audible under the instructions and calls from line five. “Those are the instructions from this station. They’re trying to fire on the Confluence. Keep moving, Chaudry.”
“If they’re firing on our rescue ship,” van Heel said, “they’ll destroy it before we get there.”
“Keep moving. Ean’s deflecting the orders. Hurry on, he can’t do it forever.”
Radko always understood.
“Small single-man craft exiting the Hellfire,” Craik said.
“They’re lifepods,” Ean said.
“Correction, lifepods,” Craik said at the same time.
Bhaksir called Sale then. “Prisoners are secure.”
“What?” Sale said. “That was hours ago.”
According to the time on Ean’s comms, they had been in the Worlds of the Lesser Gods less than half an hour.
“Can you get Ean to lock them in?”
“He’s busy.”
Ean used lines eight and three of the Confluence to sing the air lock secure. In doing so, he lost control of line three on the station momentarily, and two soldiers made it into the passage.
“Radko,” he called. “There are two armed soldiers heading your way.”
Radko didn’t give any indication she’d heard, and no wonder, for he was piping all the comms into the corridor. If he stopped that, the commander would get his order to the gunners.
Radko rounded the corner and almost ran into the soldiers.
They went down before Ean realized she had fired. She’d always had good reflexes.
After what felt longer than the longest forever in the void, Radko’s group reached the shuttle.
“In, in,” Radko said. “Don’t forget, Bach’s under arrest. Don’t let him near a weapon. Strap yourself in,” she ordered Bach. “All of you.”
Ean kept singing the commands into the empty corridor as Radko piloted the shuttle out of the bay.
The commander realized his commands weren’t getting through. “Get down to the gunner’s station,” he ordered someone. “Tell them to fire.”
Ean locked all the doors.
“What the hell? Use the emergency tunnels.”
“An unauthorized shuttle has left the station,” someone at another board said.
“Tell them to shoot the shuttle, instead,” the commander said to the person who was unscrewing the emergency hatch.
On the Confluence bridge, the only sound was Ean singing. Ean didn’t know what agreement Sale had made with the Brimstone, but it wasn’t firing at them.
He kept singing as the Confluence grabbed the shuttle and brought it in.
Chaudry grabbed the arms of his seat. “We’re hit.”
“No,” Radko said. “That’s normal.”
“Felt like a hit,” van Heel said.
“It wasn’t.”
Ean stopped singing when the shuttle was safely inside one of the small air locks on the Confluence.
“Comms back, sir,” someone on the station said.
“About time,” the station commander said. “Fire on that blasted ship.”
“Take us home,” Ean sang to the Confluence.
They entered the void as the first gunner pressed the fire button.
“Welcome home, Confluence,” Captain Helmo said.
“Radko’s got prisoners,” Ean told Sale. “Two of them.” Was Vilhjalmsson a prisoner?
“Prisoners. Right. That’s where we started. It seems so long ago now.” Sale called Bhaksir. “Stay where you are. We’re coming down. Ean says we have a couple more for you.”
“Faster?” Ean asked the ship.
“Faster.” Confirmation, affirmative.
Sale had already started running. She thumbed open her comms as she ran, “Ma’am,” to Vega. “We’ve at least forty prisoners. The fake paramedics, some Lancastrian linesmen, and two prisoners Radko brought back from the station.”