Page 73 of Blightfall

The only other choice I could think of was to wait for Jorgen to notice that our mission had gone wrong and let him send more small forces to their deaths until he figured out that this mission warranted the big guns. Who knew how long that would take or how many lives would be lost? If there was a way to prevent it, we owed it to everyone to try.

Alanik looked uncomfortable. She scratched her lapel, reaching beneath it and surreptitiously turning off her translator pin. “We are not aliens,” she said in heavily accented English.

Dayan didn’t seem fazed that a member of our team spoke a foreign language.

“That’s true,” I said. “The Superiority wouldn’t have sent human inspectors, and Ivy already knows we speak English.”

“We could tell Ivy that our dione leader died in the attack when we arrived,” Sadie said.

The dione were one of the species that ran the Superiority before it fell, and they did sometimes use humans as bodyguards, so that was plausible. “Yes,” I said. “We’re the dione’s security force. When they died, we panicked.”

“That’s close to the truth,” Nedd said.

“We’ve seen conditions here,” I continued, “and we’re prepared to give a positive report to the Superiority, say that our leader died in an accident. We’ll negotiate with Ivy to let us fly out through the debris field, and then we hyperjump home and return with a fighting force to liberate Dayan’s people.”

“I want to come with you,” Dayan said.

I hesitated. I wanted to bring them—they knew a lot more about this planet than we did, and could answer questions for Command we might not even have thought of yet.

“We don’t have a spare seat in our ships,” I said, “so you’d have to ride in the cargo space. It won’t be comfortable.”

“That’s fine,” Dayan said.

I nodded. Putting Dayan in the cargo space of a ship was risky—whoever flew with them wouldn’t be able to eject in case of emergency without killing them. But if we could get off the planet peacefully, without combat, that wouldn’t be a problem.

“We’ll need a report prepared,” I said. “Something we can show her that talks about what a great job she’s doing.”

“A great job oppressing my people,” Dayan said dryly.

It wasn’t the message I wanted to send either, but it might be the most effective. Such a report was solidly in Suki’s skill set, with all the notes she’d been taking. “There’s a member of our team who could write one,” I told Dayan. “But you haven’t met them yet.”

They looked surprised. “There are more of you in the city?”

“Sort of.” I sighed. If Dayan was coming with us, they had to adjust to the idea of alien allies. If they couldn’t accept it, we might be better off leaving them behind. “Did Nedd and Sadie tell you we are allied with aliens?”

“They mentioned that,” they said, not seeming thrilled—but they’d stayed after learning this news, so that was a good sign.

“I want to introduce you to one of them, but first I need to be sure you understand that this person is working with us. They are not to be harmed in any way.”

“You mean you don’t want me to wrap my light-whip around them and haul them into a dark alley,” Dayan said.

Nedd smiled. “For example.”

They sighed. “I won’t hurt your allies. My issue is with the aliens who are kidnapping my people, not with any who work with you.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” I said, and the zipper on Alanik’s pack slipped open, and Suki poked her head out. Alanik turned, sheltering Suki from view of the path, though the park appeared to be empty at the moment.

Dayan startled, staring at Suki with wide eyes. “What is that?”

“Suki is a kitsen,” I said. “She is a xenoanthropologist.”

“Greetings!” Suki said. “I am already composing this report!” She returned to the bag and tapped away on her data tablet.

“You have an alien xenoanthropologist in your backpack,” Dayan said.

“We have several aliens in our backpacks,” I said, opening my own bag so they could see Naga inside.

“What is that? Your team diplomatic specialist?”