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17
Aidan joined the others in the mess hall. They were finishing off Caryn’s leftovers. He had to admit, the girl’s cooking was delicious.
The sandstorm still raged below, but had diminished from a monstrous ten to a manageable six on the scale. Sadly, it was still too extreme to return to the surface, so no more vouchers could be won this round. Still, they’d managed to acquire enough to knock off five hours from their time here, which wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t good enough. Several racers had managed to get more vouchers and had already been allowed to start the next phase of the race. Aidan hated lagging behind.
Asher sat to Aidan’s left, his plate already cleared; Lear to his right, going in for seconds. Zeek and Priya both seemed lost in thought as they nibbled their food. Vin chewed loudly as he watched highlights from the race thus far on his handheld.
The silence between him and his crew had never been so thick with tension. They were divided for the first time in ages. The line of demarcation? Aidan on one side, two strange girls on the other—they’d commandeered one of the spare rooms and were currently holed up there.
Zeek and Lear sided with the girls, wanting to keep them around. Vin claimed to be undecided, but he did seem to be leaning their way. “Onnika managed to win us a voucher,” he’d reasoned.
Priya, who’d been on Aidan’s side before, now appeared conflicted, but didn’t speak up. Asher was still firmly in favor of getting rid of them, though he did suggest lettingthe little one cook again before she departed.
Slowly and surely, he was losing the confidence and devotion of his crew. Worse, Aidan was tempted to cross the line himself. That last parting look from Onnika had filled him with regret over his brash allegation. And after Priya, the securities expert, had laughed at him for it, he felt ridiculous as well.
“The gods themselves couldn’t hack the commissioner’s maps,” she’d informed him. “Let alone two petty thieves.”
But he still didn’t believe Onnika’s story about her lost home world. He could locate Pakovin right now with no trouble at all. Anyone could. They traded openly with others and welcomed outsiders. What other reason could she have to lie to him? A new theory was knocking around in his head.
“Oh shit,” Vin sputtered through a large bite of food that almost jumped out of his gaping mouth. “Did you guys see this replay? It’s brutal.”
They all turned to the large screen on the wall as Vin dialed in the feed for everyone to watch. A replay popped into view of all the ships lined up just as the race began. Aidan had witnessed evidence of a slaughter when they’d finally managed to leave Armina’s hangar, but he hadn’t thought much of it. There were always skirmishes at the start of every Phase Nine. However, this carnage was unprecedented. Ships viciously targeted each other the instant the race began, two and three against one, as if alliances had been arranged beforehand. Hulls were ripped open, shrapnel and metal rocketing in all directions. Chunks were gouged from ships, leaving huge, gaping wounds that bled fuel, supplies, and people. A few lucky ones got away entirely unscathed, evading the battle entirely in favor of a gaining a jumpstart on the race. Others were eviscerated.
The whole thing was quick and dirty; only a few minutes of carnage had elapsed before the lure of the race took the victors away, but at least thirty ships had been incapacitated or destroyed, several others hobbled. If the replay had kept going, it might have shownDragoonflying though that field moments later.
Vin turned off the feed and they all shared a look. Aidan knew what everyone was thinking: It was lucky they hadn’t been on that starting line after all.
Movement by the hatch caught their attention. Caryn shrank back shyly under their gazes, hugging the hatchway.
Lear leaned forward in his seat. “Hey, is everything all right?”
“I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“You’re not interrupting anything.” Aidan experienced an odd current of disappointment to see that Onnika wasn’t with her, but at least it provided him with an opportunity to pry information from her without Onnika present…and to test out his new theory. “Come. Have a seat.”
Caryn twisted a lock of tawny hair around her finger. “I don’t want to bother you. I was just wondering if it was possible if maybe it would be all right—if you don’t mind, that is—if I could take some food back to my bunk with me?”
“You can eat here with us,” Lear suggested.
Her gaze darted between him and Aidan, then briefly to Asher and back. “That’s okay. It’s not for me, anyway. I know Oni hasn’t eaten in a while, and her stomach is growling, so I thought I’d bring her something…if that’s all right.”
Aidan glowered. “If she’s hungry, she can join us here in the mess hall. We all eat meals together.”
“We do?” Zeek replied, employing a comically confused look.
“We do today…from now on.”
Caryn backpedaled. “Oh. Okay. Never mind, then. Sorry to have—”
“Wait,” Aidan called. “We need to have a little chat.” He kicked the chair across from him out from under the table. “Have a seat.”
Resting on the top bunk, Onnika sat up, suddenly worried. After dozing off and on, she looked at the time and realized Caryn had been gone for a while.
Even though Onnika had insisted she wasn’t hungry, her growling tummy had betrayed her.
She wasn’t keen on the idea of asking Aidan for anything more, and blatantly refused to do so, so Caryn had insisted on going in her stead. Now Onnika wondered if it had been a bad idea to let her go at all.
Planting her hands on the edge of the bunk, she pushed off, landing on the hard metal floor with a clank. Lear might seem like a nice enough guy, but the rest of them…who could say? Poking her head out into the narrow passageway, she glanced left, then right. Empty. From the direction of the mess hall, the soft hum of voices echoed. She eased closer until she could make out who was speaking. Aidan. Damn. She didn’t want to see him, not after the way he’d looked at her before—like she was no better than a pest.
