Page 63 of Experimental Voyage
“How was it limped?”
“He went with a towing escort, and the ship itself was lowered to the planet’s surface using a gravitational towing system.”
Both Veloc snickered over Waldren’s misfortunes.
I had to clear my throat to keep from laughing at the thought of a bunch of feathered murder machines forcing the poor man to Cremora Delta to get specialty repairs. “Which systems did you break?”
“Most of them. If it wasn’t mandatory to provide life, it has a gremlin pestering him in some fashion or another. The changes done to his ship were carefully recorded, and if you manage to bring all his systems online, it will count as your application for master certification. Then you will need to do six similar level repairs to earn your new level of certification.”
“You Veloc are sneaky,” I praised. “The school knew I would run for the spaceport at the first opportunity.”
“They expected for you to flee the day before yesterday, and they marvel at your patience. They also caught you preparing to flee, but as you managed to offer viable excuses, they did not feel a need to mention they were aware of your activities.”
Damn. “I should have started several months ago,” I grumbled.
“That might have helped, but only a little.” Geltri petted Plague, and as the death horse seemed to appreciate his attention, I tossed him her reins. “Was she truly wild before you got her?”
“She was. They’re pretty smart—much smarter than the horses rescued from Earth. Fortunately for my sanity, they can cohabitate the same pasture with Earth horses. Even better, Pestilence had zero interest in mounting the Earth mares. They wanted to try cross-breeding. He wouldn’t even acknowledge them when in season. He certainly acknowledged Plague!” For three days, I’d accepted that Plague and Pestilence had one interest, which had involved procreation. When the animals hadn’t been actively mating, they’d been cuddling together and refusing to be separated, not even to go into their stalls for the night.
As such, they’d shared a stall, much to the frustration of everyone except for me.
Pestilence adored his Plague, and what Plague wanted, she got. With that understanding in mind, I’d allowed the animals to have their way while the Deltans struggled with the concept the death horses couldn’t be fully controlled.
“You will turn the clan lucky enough to win you upside down,” Geltri predicted.
“And what about Waldren?”
“You’ve already done that. He’ll be fine, especially once he sees how you have blossomed upon being given the opportunity.Just throw one of us in his direction, and he will relax. He understands the fine art of tossing Veloc.”
That he did. “Are you volunteering?”
Geltri hooted his laughter. “You are welcome to try. But will you succeed? We will learn the truth of that soon enough.”
TWENTY-ONE
“You do not make idle threats.”
Waldren’s shiphad gotten a great deal of work done to her, including reinforcements to her hull, new monitoring sensors, and a coupling assembly capable of handling a small racer. I’d enjoy the work involved in checking over every new component, and I had every intention of billing the Veloc responsible for abusing such a beauty.
“Waldren didn’t get a new ship, did he?” I’d wanted him to have his dream ship, and while he loved his vessel, I’d learned about the wonderful upgrades available if only he had the currency to buy one.
“He has put in an order for his new beauty, but she won’t be ready for two years. She’s a specialty exploration ship, and when she’s finished, she’ll be one of the fastest in the universe. Not only will she be fast, but she’ll be large enough to tow this ship, which is why he is having her refitted.”
I whistled at the thought of being able to work with a top class exploration ship. “Just towing?”
“He picked a model that couples rather than hauls in a bay.” Xaltri pointed at the coupling assembly. “This is thesmaller version of the model, and he’ll be able to access both ships through a docking assembly. If there is an emergency—or internal explosion—there’s still a chance for survival this way.”
One of my classes had been a debate on interior storage of spare ships versus coupling, and I’d been unable to decide on which I preferred. If given my way, I would have gone with both systems.
Most ships couldn’t handle both systems.
“Was there any damage done during the delivery of the ship?”
“Fortunately for Waldren’s sanity, his baby landed without incident. He wasn’t permitted to be on board during the landing.”
I nodded, as while the system was safe most of the time, every rare now and again, something failed and resulted in a heavily damaged ship and a destroyed landing pad. “All right. I hope you bastards kept the right parts, because if I have to special order anything, you’re molting onmyschedule, and your baubles will become my baubles.”
“We have smuggled all required parts on board as our personal allotments. You won’t need to molt us,” Xaltri promised, and his crest flattened. “You do not make idle threats.”
