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Isloshed through puddleson my way to bossman Geo’s office. How would he take it when I informed him I wouldn’t be building dwellings for the foreseeable future? I didn’t even know howIfelt about it.
A siren blared through the colony, the first I’d heard. It stopped me in my tracks. My eyes darted toward the nearby bakery. D’ovey would know what was happening.
“JayJay.” Beads of perspiration dotted D’ovey’s wrinkled brow. He swiped the hem of his apron over his shiny brown skin, dusting it with flour while one razor-sharp tooth worried his lower lip. “What’s that awful sound?”
I bumped a rack of warm graneth puffs to my right as I strained my ears for sounds of danger. “Yurstille must have an emergency response system in place?”
“What in the galaxy is going on out there?” D’ovey came to stand by me, and we both peered through his open door at nothing. Even though the threat hadn’t shown itself, the back of my head pounded.
My stomach growled at the yeasty tang in the air, but the thunder of approaching feet occupied my senses. A water container on the window ledge beside me held a few early blooms, their flower heads vibrating on their stalks. From our doorway vantage point, it seemed every available enforcer jogged through the puddle-strewn main street.
When D’irk came into view, I tipped my chin to a bewildered D’ovey, his apron string in knots. I sprinted away from the bakery, calling over my shoulder, “I’m sure Sisip will send word soon.”
Moments later, I fell into step with the brown-skinned Boola. “What the blant is happening?”
A bandolier of knives crisscrossed D’irk’s chest, glinting in the late winter sun. One of the many Boola colonists on Tern, he was among the few who’d encountered hellsna—twice now.
“That big white veiny bastard seems to have gone back to its nest and awoken its friends, is what’s happened.”
“They should still be in their overwintering grounds. It’s too cold for them to be rousing now,” I said, more to myself than to Sisip’s second-in-command.
“Well, I’ll let you talk those ugly worm faces back to bed. Tell me how it goes.” D’irk’s voice was flat, but his lips twisted up.
I snorted as I ran at D'irk’s side, bypassing the enforcers ahead of us. “The flying toy diversion may have angered it.”
Pink mud splattered around my ankles, and a mounting pressure built among the enforcers.
D’irk’s razor-sharp teeth clacked as he ground them back and forth. “That’s an understatement. They’re mad as hell. The last patrol reported all five hellsna headed directly toward town.”
Blant, where’s Ginger? Geo better have her at home recovering still.
My longer stride stuttered beside D’irk’s as I forced my feet toward answers rather than behind me to Ginger. We ran past the shuttered cantina. Usually teeming with revelers at any time of the rotation, the silence was unnerving. The alarm quieted as we stormed past the town center to the outskirts of Yurstille. A rooster’s crow took up the call from inside the plant-filled greendwelling, its lamar windows streaked with condensation. On the outskirts of the wastelands, the headquarters’ bay doors rattled open ahead of us, and the squelch of feet pounding the ground was replaced with enforcers catching their breaths.
Before I moved on, I cupped D’irk’s shoulder. “Let’s put them to bed for good.” I spotted Sisip in the crowd and made my way toward her.
Even on Yagras, where soldiers trained daily to fight the giant beasts, five at once were terrible odds. The need to take control of the situation pulsed through my veins.
“JayJay, just who I wanted to see.” Sisip briefly acknowledged me before her jaw tightened and she wrapped up the instructions to the Boola enforcer on her left. The wisps on the points of her ears flicked as she turned to face me. “We’ll need you sooner than I thought. Are you willing?”
On instinct, my boots snapped together, and my shoulders shifted back. “At your service.”
“You will lead a team of five. I’m giving you D’irk, one of my most experienced. The rest are all untried in battle.” She projected a three-dimensional image from her wristport into the air and pointed to a small patch of level ground past the ruins.
As she relayed her commands, doubt licked my heels. If someone died, would I be held accountable? What kind of cruel punishment might I face if the Intergalactic Federation sentenced me for a crime I had no control over? Another banishment?
Deep in thought, Sisip sucked in her striped cheeks. “It’s tough ground, but it will also be tough ground for the hellsna. The coordinates will be sent out momentarily.” Her voice cracked, the first sign of emotion flickering through her commands. “Your team will be the front line. There will be a quick debrief at the hoverbike bay.”
She passed me a com that allowed two-way communication with her and my team, and I pressed the round disk until it adhered behind my ear.
“May the goddess Sola be with you.” Sisip patted my back and forged through the crowd of enforcers to give directions to the next team leader.
“Wait,” I called over the clamoring voices. “The people in town are worried. Are you able to make an announcement over that system?”
“Good thinking.” Her wispy ears flickered, and she motioned an enforcer over.
I counted heads. If this was all the enforcers that meant five teams. Would that be enough? Blant. On Yagras, there would be many more reinforcements. And trained soldiers at that.
