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Her dark eyes filled with a slight film of tears, and she blinked rapidly at me and whispered, “I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything.” I pressed my forehead to hers, then gave her lips one last kizz. “Just be careful.”
I made to move away, but she clung to me, her voice going fierce and determined. “You too. You promise me, too.”
“I will try,” I said, unwilling to lie. For if it came down to her or me, there was no choice. I would do anything to save her.
“Captain!” Kirel called out again.
I grabbed her helmet and seated it over her head, then put on my own. We sprinted for the waiting elevator, which carried us up a floor, then ran onto the bridge.
A planet filled the main viewscreen, a beige and gray world without any discernable oceans.
“Is that it?” I asked. “Is that the Grug home world?
“I think so,” Kirel said. “We’ve got some anomalous readings. I think the entire surface is one big city.”
“God, how can they live like that?” Mol-Lee said.
“It’s…” Hay-Zul’s voice had the hollow quality it got when she accessed the information the Grug supermind had put in her head. “It is all one city… all one… home. There’s not a good word for it.”
“Is it where the telepathy-field signal’s coming from?” Vivv asked.
“No,” Kirel said, and the view on the screen shifted sideways until it centered a pale-gray moon. “That’s coming from here.”
“I don’t get it.” Vivv took a step closer. “Where are all the warships?”
“Captain, we’ve got incoming comms from the planet!”
“Answer it,” I said.
“Invaders!” a Grug voice boomed. “You dare to enter sovereign Grug territory.”
I called upon all the long years of training my mother had instilled. “We did not know this was Grug territory,” I lied, before offering a political truth. “This sector of space is not specified as such in the treaty. There has been no violation.”
“You mince words.”
“You created a telepathy field that has killed thousands,” I said. “How’s that for directness?”
Instead of acknowledging what I’d said with either confirmation or denial, the Grug said, “What do you want?”
“We demand you turn off all the emitters that make the telepathy field,” Vivv answered.
“No!” The bellow resounded through the bridge and my helmet speakers.
I tapped at the controls on the left forearm of my spacesuit, limiting my comms to the bridge crew. “Mol-Lee, fly us to the moon. Sul, get the weapons ready. Kirel, let the other ships know to get ready to fight. It’s time we stop asking and show them why the Zaarn are the most formidable warriors in the seven sectors.”
“Wrin,” Vivv said, “I don’t like this. Where are their ships?”
“I don’t know, but we’ll use that arrogance against them.” I toggled my comms back to the open channel.
“Grug home world. We are an alliance of the Sjisji, Tula, Hyoo-mons, and both factions of Zaarn. We demand that you shut down the telepathy field that covers this sector of space. We are prepared to fight.”
“Foolish aliens, thinking any of you could compare to the superiority of the Grug.”
“Sul, fire a warning blast at the moon’s surface, somewhere uninhabited.”
“Got it, boss.”
