Starsight

Oh . . . right. He was still angry because I’d muted him earlier. I winced, unhooking his mobile receptor, and clicked it back into the dash. “Sorry about that. You were going to get me into trouble.”

“Spensa, it’s impossible for me to get you into trouble. I can merely point out preexisting trouble.”

“I said I was sorry.”

“Well, obviously you don’t want me around. I can logically conclude, using very little processing power, that you feel you are better off without me.”

“Were all AIs as sulky as you are?” I asked.

“We were made as reflections of humankind, meant to imitate their actions and emotions.”

“Ouch. I asked for that one, didn’t I?” I glanced toward the green light that appeared on the wall, indicating that Cobb and Rodge were out and the bay was ready to depressurize. I engaged the maneuvering thrusters, then the door opened, and I steered my ship out into the vacuum.

A few minutes later, Kimmalyn’s ship hovered out of her own docking bay. “Hey,” she said over the line. “What exactly are we doing again?”

“We’ve spotted an unidentified alien ship approaching the planet. It’s coming in through the defensive layers right now.” I boosted forward alongside the thin edge of the platform.

Kimmalyn fell in behind me. “A single ship? Huh.”

“I know.” I left off the part where I thought I’d felt it approaching. I didn’t know what that meant yet—or even if it was real. “Let’s go.”

“Let’s go,” a voice said from behind me in the cockpit, and I jumped. I spun my head to see a yellow-and-blue slug nestled into the spot between my toolkit and the cockpit’s emergency water supply.

“Doomslug?” I said.

The little animal mimicked the sound, as she was inclined to do. Great. I should’ve been annoyed at Dobsi and the rest of the ground crew for not keeping an eye on the slug, but . . . well, they weren’t pet sitters, they were mechanics. Plus, Doomslug had a habit of getting into places she wasn’t supposed to.

Hopefully I wouldn’t have to do any dangerous maneuvers; I wasn’t sure how many Gs Doomslug could pull. For now, I boosted toward the strange ship. True to his word, M-Bot didn’t say anything to me—but he did lay out a direction on the monitor, pointing the way we should head to intercept the ship. He then wrote a message for me on the screen.

I’m tracking the ship’s progress via our surveillance beacons, and it is NOT taking a wise pathway. Multiple platforms are firing upon it.

“Huh,” I said to him. “Maybe the technicians were right. They think it’s a scout drone sent to test something about the platforms.”

There is a logic to that, he replied onscreen. If that ship had intended to actually reach Detritus, it would have picked a course that wove between the platforms, staying out of range. The Krell know how to do such things.

I turned my ship and boosted in the direction M-Bot indicated, enjoying the sensation of g-forces pressing me back. I always felt more in control of my life when I was in a cockpit. I sighed, trying to push away the uneasiness I felt at having watched the video of that . . . thing.

“Interception in a minute and a half,” M-Bot said.

“What happened to the silent treatment?” I asked.

“You were looking too comfortable,” he said. “I decided that being silent is the wrong approach. Instead, I need to remind you what you’re missing while not talking to me—by showing you how wonderful my interaction is.”

“Whoopee.”

“Whoopee!” Doomslug repeated.

“I’m glad you two are pleased.”

I boosted a little faster.

“Wait,” M-Bot said. “Was that sarcasm?”

“From me? Never.”

“Good. I . . . Wait. It was sarcasm!”

Ahead, a twinkling bit of light broke through the bottom layer of the defensive shells. A ship . . . trailing smoke.

“The ship made it through,” I said. “But it’s been hit.”

“I can’t believe that you—”

“M-Bot, archive that conversation,” I said. “The enemy ship. How bad is the damage?”

“Moderately bad,” he answered. “I’m surprised it’s still in one piece. At this angle, my projections say it will crash into the planet and vaporize itself on impact.”

“Permission to give chase,” I said, calling Flight Command. “That ship is heading for the surface on a collision course.”

“Granted,” Cobb’s voice answered. “But keep your distance.”

Kimmalyn and I pulled in behind the ship, following it down toward the atmosphere of the planet. I could see the alien ship trying to pull up—it was a motion I instinctively recognized. I’d been there, in a damaged ship threatening to spiral into a crash. I’d fought unresponsive controls in a panic, the smell of smoke overwhelming, my world spinning.