Sunrunner
Copyright© 2023 by K. P. Sweeney
Chapter 17
Boot manager activated...
Initializing hardware ... done
Identifying operating system ... done
Loading operating system ... done
Transferring control to the operating system ... done
Recovering data ... done
Manufacturer security screen ... override
Enabling audio...
“-don’t give a fuck about the security protocol. Start the fucking program!”
“Ma’am, violence of any kind will not be tolerated in-”
“Who said anything about violence?”
“You’re glowing, ma’am. Your psionics are clearly activated.”
“Oh, right. That’s because I’m going to kill someone if you don’t start the fucking program.”
“We’re not going to kill anyone. Please skip the security screen. It’s a known issue with this model.”
“I’ve already done so, just keep her away from me.”
Enabling video...
A square faced human with dark hair in a crew cut filled the entirety of BOB’s primary camera. Adam, BOB recalled. Adam was forcefully shoved out of frame and replaced with a round faced, pink haired halfling. Odybrix, BOB recalled. Visibly distressed.
“Would you like a beverage!”
Odybrix lowered her head and wrapped her arms around BOB, revealing the environs. Familiar individuals surrounded BOB. Zenith. Elf, pilot, family issues. Hoxley. Infernum, studious, cowardly. Jim. Advanced medical bot, lacking social programming. Sturdy. Stowaway, mercenary, reserved.
“Not right now,” Odybrix said, wiping an eye, “but soon!”
“You’re looking a little misty, Ody,” Zenith said.
“I’m not crying,” Odybrix said, crying.
“Do you remember who you are?” Adam asked.
“Yes!”
“Do you remember what happened?”
“Yes! In excruciating detail!” BOB said, brightly.
“How do you feel?” Zenith asked.
“I am incapable of organic emotion, but in a hypothetical situation where I could feel useless emotions, I would be filled with unbridled rage and a searing desire for vengeance! I am going to kill Harlow!”
“I understand the urge,” Zenith said, raising a hand in a placating gesture, “I would ask that you hold off on killing him for the time being.”
“I am going to maim Harlow!”
“That’s fair,” Zenith said.
“Someone is missing!” BOB said, loading archived files. “Buddy! Where is Buddy?”
“She’s in a surgery suite on the other side of the building,” Adam explained. “We can go see her if you’re feeling up to it.”
“She suffered a dissection of her spinal cord after being bitten by a mutant monstrosity!”
“It looks like BOB’s back to normal,” Hoxley said.
“I am going to kill Vaelor!”
“Maybe slightly more murderous,” Hoxley corrected.
“No one’s going to stop you there, BOB,” Zenith said, “though you might have some competition.”
Buddy laid face down on a pristine white table. A series of unseen, curved robotic arms hung from above, diligently tending to her exposed spine. The technician attending to her procedure tapped her on the shoulder and whispered some exciting news in her ear. She nodded eagerly, a challenging thing to do with her face nestled into a hole. The technician hit a button and the chatter of familiar voices from beyond an observation window filled the room.
“She’d like to say hi,” the tech said as Buddy waved her arm at the elbow.
Voice muffled by headrest, she said, “Hi guys!”
“Hey Buddy!” Hoxley said.
“Doin’ alright in there?” Odybrix asked.
“Hi Buddy!”
“Is that BOB?” Buddy asked.
“Correct!”
“I’m so glad you’re okay! I wanna give you a big hug, but I’m paralyzed at the moment.”
“I will engage you in a comforting embrace shortly!” BOB said, angling to face the technician. “When will she be fully repaired?”
“The nerve and bone tissue have been printed. They’re just sewing her up now.”
The suspended arms of the medical suite moved with blistering speed and precision. Minute pincers grasped at her skin, pulling the open wound closed as new tissue was printed. A pulsating laser glided across the seam, sealing the incision without a hint of a scar. A device clamping her shoulders released and raised itself into the ceiling.
“Okay, you can get up slowly,” the med tech said.
Buddy nearly jumped off the table to look at her friends. The technician spat out an alarmed jumble of words and quickly handed Buddy a hospital gown. In a few excited strides she was out of the medical suite and in the hallway. She dove at BOB and wrapped them in a big hug. She was unsure if robots could feel hugs, so she squeezed extra hard.
“You look great!” Buddy said, looking the robot up and down. “They even repainted your chassis.”
BOB approached a glass door and inspected the reflection, “Acceptable!”
“You must feel relieved to feel your legs again,” Adam said.
“Yeah,” Buddy said, wiggling her toes. “But it wasn’t so bad. Now I know what a severed spinal cord feels like.”
“I aspire to your level of blitheness,” Hoxley said. “Should we fill them in here or...”
“Back on the ship,” Adam said. “I think she could use a set of clothes.”
“And a beverage!”
“So this Gregor guy is meeting with Vaelor in two days?” Buddy asked, leaning forward in her chair.
“Right,” Adam said.
“And he’s going to buy an ancient thingy from him. Like the one we saw and the one that this Kron guy is looking for?”
“More likely to steal than buy, but yes.”
“And the gold mech with the brain inside—the one from Levisia that called me Charlie—it’s here too.”
“Correct.”
“So it sounds like we’re going to need some firepower,” Buddy concluded.
“No kidding,” Odybrix said distractedly, tinkering with a grenade.
BOB entered the hold and exclaimed, “Who would like a premium roast coffee?”
Odybrix slammed the grenade on the table, causing everyone in the hold to flinch. She grabbed her empty mug and shot out of her seat. BOB’s spigot extended and poured the steaming liquid into the cup. The aroma filled the hold, and, within moments, a line had formed in front of BOB.
“The infernum has explained that he has been acting as your barista in my absence! Please know that I understand the reason for your betrayal and forgive you! The infernum has already offered a substandard apology for his treachery and confirmed that he will cease further attempts to usurp me!”
“I wasn’t trying to usurp anyone.” Hoxley said, exasperated.
“A denial cannot come after a confession!” BOB said. “You are overwhelmed by my near-death experience, and guilt has confused your feeble flesh-mind!”
“I’m not feeling guilty about anything, either.”
“You would have been pleased to see me die then?”
“That’s not what I meant at all!”
“Okay, okay, we’re happy to have you back,” Odybrix said. “And I am personally very sorry for drinking Hoxley’s swill. Let’s let the argument drop. No need to get human resources involved.”
Sturdy shifted on the crate he was leaning against and asked, “You have a human resources rep aboard?”
“It’s a rifle with the initials “HR” etched into the barrel,” Adam said with a sigh.
The comms crackled and Zenith chimed in from the bridge, “On firepower, what are we working with, Ody?.”
“Enough small arms to equip everyone. Of those, only six are energy weapons: two Lendaren plasma rifles, two Z90 laser pistols, a stormshot carbine, and a rinky dink auto-laser. As far as explosives,” she said, snapping up the grenade from the table, “twenty frags, three incendiaries, a couple of flash bangs, and an EMP.”
BOB trilled his disapproval of the latter.
“We’ll be sure not to detonate it anywhere near you, pal.”
“Though I think we will need to detonate it,” Adam said. “It’s likely going to be the only thing that can affect Harlow’s mech, and only briefly. Even if there’s a breach in its faraday cage, most war-mechs have redundant boot up systems combat EMP shocks. It might buy us a few seconds.”
“What about our mech,” Buddy offered, “my second set of legs from Levisia.”
“Gladiator mechs are designed for enforcing order on a populace. It might draw some fire, but if Harlow focuses on it, the GEM will be too slow to defend itself.”
“What does that leave us with?” Hoxley asked.
“We picked up a flamethrower from that derelict ship,” Odybrix said.
“I’ve got my new weird gun,” Buddy volunteered, brightly.
“What the hell is that?” Sturdy asked, stepping forward to inspect the weapon.
“One of those mutant people gave it to me. I like the grip.”
“As in, it made it?” Hoxley asked. “Are you sure it’s a pistol?”
“I haven’t shot it yet, but I’m pretty sure. I could try it out in the armory.”
“No,” Adam said, reflexively, “we don’t know what that is. It could blow up, or irradiate you. And I don’t think we have many rad pills left.”
Jim stepped out of medical and into the hold.
“Enough to continue treating your previous irradiation. Further exposure would require more medical or, more likely, nano-surgical intervention.”
“Heya doc,” Odybrix said, “have you come to tell us you’ve been hiding a stash of high yield explosives in the medicine cabinet?”
“No. I am here to advise that Buddy and BOB have clean bills of health and can take part in away missions.”
“That’s great news,” Buddy said.
“I would have gone anyway!” BOB said.
“Our best bet is the EMP?” Hoxley asked. “So we damage the mech, stun it, then what? We’re not even including Vaelor in this equation.”
“Can’t you just lightning him?” Buddy asked.
“I was planning on staying aboard, honestly,” Hoxley said.
“The hell you are,” Odybrix said.
“We could use the GEM to try and pry open Harlow’s hatch after the EMP stuns him,” Sturdy said. “The pilot will need to wait outside the grenade’s effective radius, then swoop in.”
Adam held a hand to his face in frustration, saying, “It’s too slow for that. The mech will be halfway done rebooting by the time a GEM could get close enough. A few seconds later, that massive beam blade comes online and carves our mech and its pilot in half. Wait a minute.”
Adam hopped out of his seat and tapped at a comms panel, “Ozzy, open a channel to Kron’s ship.”
“Patching you through to the HWS Terror,” Ozzy said.
“Captain val Kron, here. Is that you, Adam?”
“It is. We’re discussing our options for dealing with Vaelor. What does the Grolvar representative intend to do?”
“I was just mulling that over with the crew. We’ve got man-power and artillery, but getting it planetside is going to be a customs issue. If we do manage to come in heavily armed, there’s a good chance we get spotted and Vaelor goes to ground.”
“It’s the inverse problem for us. We’ve got a small team that could probably slip in unnoticed—maybe even draw Vaelor and Harlow into a conversation—but we haven’t got the firepower to take out that super mech.”
“Well, if you’re looking to equalize the battlefield, Grolvar can lend you its strength.”
“What ‘strength’ are we talking about here?”
“We’ve got a few mechs in the armory, but I think the F2200 would be what you need to even the odds.”
Zenith cut in over comms, trying to contain her disbelief and enthusiasm, “You’re just going to give us a military grade air mech?”
“Consider it a loan in good faith. I don’t care who ultimately kills Vaelor, so long as he’s dead and the High Warlord gets her relic back.”
“We’ve still got the same issue of slipping heavy arms through Gemheart customs,” Hoxley said.
“A single mech isn’t going to be a problem,” Odybrix said. “I can pull in one more favour with my old contacts here.”
“Great!” Kron said. “Shady, but great. I’ll have my people add some tracer rounds to the inventory. If for whatever reason you can’t kill Vaelor, tag him with a tracer. The Terror will monitor the operation from orbit. If Vaelor gets aboard a ship, we’ll blast him out of the sky before he breaks atmo.”
“Gemheart authorities won’t be happy about that,” Adam said. “You might be starting an interplanetary dispute with the Starbreaker Empire.”
“That’s what politicians are for,” Kron said with a laugh. “But thanks for your concern. If this goes well, maybe we all meet up for another drink at that bar again.”
“I’d like that. Our AI will coordinate the drop-off after Odybrix gets in touch with her contacts. Stay in touch, Kron.”
“Good luck, Sunrunner crew. HWS Terror out.”
Adam let out a short sigh and said, “Well that’s going to help.”
“Is it?” Hoxley asked. “How much faster is this one compared to the GEM?”
“F2200s are military grade mech-jet combos,” Buddy said distractedly while examining her strange new gun, “they can reach a speed of mach 10 in jet mode, mach 4 when deployed as a mech.”
There was a moment of silence as the crew observed their amnesiac companion.
“What?” Buddy asked.
“Your occasional deluge of knowledge is astonishing,” Hoxley said.
“I just wish it worked for this thing,” she said, frowning at the gun.
“Buddy is correct,” Adam said, picking up the explanation, “it’s fast, has formidable firepower, and can likely hold its own against the super mech. In the short term anyway.”
“If you have a decent pilot,” Sturdy said.
“We do,” Zenith said, over comms. “I’ll go toe to toe with Harlow.
“Are you sure you’re going to be up to that?” Adam asked. “I have pilot training. Buddy might know how to fly it too. You don’t have to put yourself in this position. If things go sideways...”
“Whether he’s captured or killed, I’ll be the one responsible for Harlow.”
The diagnostic tool chimed pleasantly, an endorsement that the new mech was ready for battle. It was the fifth diagnostic Zenith ran since the F2200 was delivered. Was it unnecessary? Probably, but if she didn’t do something during the intervening period before the battle, she would go mad. Worse, she might start biting her nails—a habit she kicked a decade ago.
The second the call ended with Kron, she locked the bridge and started running the combat simulator. She had clocked hundreds of hours in mech sims, and a respectable amount of time in actual mechs, but none of them were military grade. Moreover, her experience, sim or otherwise, didn’t include black market rendezvous dogfights atop abandoned hospitals. Oh, and the enemy combatant was her brother—a small wrinkle that didn’t occur in most skirmishes.
She let out a controlled breath, which modulated into a heavy sigh. More than anything she wanted to rip Harlow out of that mech and slap some sense into him—to make him remember who he was: a pilot, a survivor, a son, a brother. The cruel reality was that ejecting him from his metal shell would be nearly impossible. Even if the timing was right, there was no guarantee that the F2200 could pry open the cockpit. She would, in all likelihood, be fighting her brother to the death. A sour smile crossed her face as she thought about how sibling rivalry had, in part, shaped her into a pilot. And now being a pilot would result in the permanent end of that rivalry.
“Are you alright in there?!” A voice called from the back of the mech.
“I’m fine, BOB,” she answered.
“The tone of your voice is registering at thirty-five decibels, a fifteen point difference from normal levels! This indicates you are likely experiencing troubling emotions!”
“I’m fine,” she lied, trying to extract the brooding tone from her voice.
“It can be advantageous for organic beings to divulge their internal monologue to a trusted compatriot! Would you like to unburden yourself of these feelings?!”
“I don- you know what, sure. I’m coming to terms with the possibility that I may have to kill someone I love dearly. Actually, it’s incredibly likely I’m going to have to kill him. And if I’m too slow to make that call, other people I care about are going to die. So yes, my decibels are a little low right now.”
“That is a heavy burden to bear! If it is of consolation, in my experience, you have never been ‘too slow’ at anything!”
“Luck’s gotta run out at some point. How are you feeling?”
“I am not inhibited by the chemically-induced torrent of emotions that plagues organics!”
“You seemed pretty eager for revenge earlier. That’s not very robot of you.”
“That was merely an expression of my desire for self preservation! Such dialogue is for the benefit of non-synthetics!”
“Maybe, but it certainly sounded like you were pissed—rightfully—at my brother.”
“It was not the first instance where I was nearly destroyed, but it was the most pronounced! Regardless, while your brother did bifurcate me, I sincerely wish we are able to capture him without terminal trauma!”
“Thanks, BOB. I really mean it. Thank you.”
“Has our discussion improved your mental well-being?!”
“Yes.”
“Splendid!”
Zenith was silent for a moment, then asked, “Do you log the decibel levels of all of the crew?”
“Yes!”
“Out of curiosity...”
“Odybrix regularly speaks at a range of sixty-five to ninety decibels! Her volume is similar to that of a vacuum or an alarm clock!”
“Perfect,” Zenith said, smiling. “I figured as much.”
A warning pinged and lit up the mech’s display. Flying in from the west were two vehicles, a long black van and a black limo. The scanners of the military grade mech quickly determined the vehicles’ threat levels and flooded the screen with data. Both vehicles were armor-plated with several artillery options hidden within. The limo, curiously, had two engines. Zenith puzzled at the readout before realizing the vehicle could split into two functional pieces—A getaway car.
She marvelled at the mech’s ability to completely understand an enemy within seconds. Military hardware was a cut above what she was used to. The information would be invaluable in a firefight, even if the sheer volume of data the sensors pumped out was somewhat distracting. Is this what you’ve been working with this whole time, brother?
Zenith opened a comm line to the crew who weren’t riding on her back, “Looks like our black market boy is here.”
“Roger. Any sign of Vaelor or Harlow?” Adam asked in a whisper.
“None. And I’m pretty confident that this thing would spot them from miles out. What about inside?”
Adam’s vid feed panned away from the roof door and down a cavernous stairwell. “Empty. I’d be worried about ghosts if we weren’t already fighting monsters.”
It wasn’t uncommon for public service buildings to be abandoned, even hospitals like this one. Planet-scale mining operations often developed in stages, establishing preliminary structures to fortify their claim and building up over time. Gemheart had outgrown the basic infrastructure as its population swelled. This trend would continue until the planet was stripped bare of anything valuable. After that, every building would be like this one, an empty shell in a dead city on a dead planet.
The vehicles came to a hovering stop at the side of the roof. A team of ten dwarves, dressed in black suits and carrying a variety of automatic weapons, spilled out of the van. They swept out, surveying the space around the elevated landing pad. Two of the goons ascended a set of stairs and inspected the elevator at the edge of the pad. One pressed the button to summon the lift, the other, less patient dwarf, produced a crowbar and pried the doors open. He peered inside then tapped his wrist and said something over a private comm channel. To Zenith’s surprise and delight, the mech began displaying a dialogue on the screen.
“Shaft’s clear ... cables non-functional. Confirm stairwell.”
Zenith’s chest tightened when a dwarf approached the entry to the rooftop staircase, out of her line of sight. Adam and the crew waited behind the door. If they were found, they’d become embroiled in a firefight with these thugs. Their boss would flee and take any chance of intercepting Vaelor with him.
“You have incoming,” Zenith said over comms, “keep quiet and turn off your torches. He’ll see the light under the door.”
She watched as each vid feed went black, leaving her blind to what was happening. With a sudden bloom of colour, Sturdy and Hoxley’s feeds illuminated the screen with thermal vision. The orange silhouette of the thug swam forward with a hand outstretched for the door. Three rapid bangs echoed through the stairwell as he jerked the handle and rattled the rusted deadbolt on the other side. The silhouette stood in front of the door, unmoving for an uncomfortable length of time, then...
“All clear!”
“Thank the fucking stars they don’t have thermals,” Zenith muttered as the glowing silhouette of Odybrix flipped the dwarf off.
“Another instance of the profound inadequacy of organic forms!” BOB chimed.
“You don’t have thermals either. Wait, someone’s making an appearance.”
A tall figure stepped out of the limo accompanied by ten more thugs. Dressed in a black trench coat and, surprisingly not a dwarf, the black market dealer, Gregor, surveyed the rooftop. With a few slight hand gestures, he commanded the goon squad to set a perimeter on the elevated landing pad. His head swept from side to side, searching. You’re wondering where Vaelor is too.
Zenith eyed the sensor readout, looking for any sign of an approaching mech or transport, but the only little red dots were the people already present. It was possible, even likely, that Harlow’s mech had some degree of stealth adaptation. Given everything the mech could do, being untraceable to long range scans wasn’t a stretch. Zenith begins cycling through visual sweeps of the surrounding city, spotting nothing but distant traffic and a couple of cargo ships flying high above. When the visual returned to the black market dealer she slapped the toggle button, locking the feed.
A corona of black formed several feet away from the dealer, spurring assembled thugs to converge on their employer with guns drawn. A wreath of twisting smoke formed the emanation—a perfect circle. The sinuous black tendrils coiled and undulated as they wormed their way around the circumference. The unsettling movement stuck in Zenith’s mind like a spike. It was similar to something she had seen before.
The gang on the roof stood motionless before the phenomenon until the serpentine motion stopped. Guns and rifles snapped up, ready to pulp whatever emerged with lead and laser. A foot stepped out from the empty space within the circle, then a tall, slender figure emerged, dressed in a robe and wearing a white mask. The frozen halo of black unseized a moment later and vanished in wisps of smoke.
Where is Harlow?
“Quite an entrance,” the man in black said.
The dwarves jolted, sweeping their guns about the roof. Something has spooked them. Zenith thought back to her first encounter with Vaelor and the disturbing intrusion of his voice into her mind. The sensation was a nauseating invasion of privacy, and she was glad not to be a part of the current conversation. Though it meant she would only hear half of what was being said.
“Charming,” Gregor said, holding a hand to his head. “You have what I’ve requested?”
Vaelor produced a small metal cylinder and held it out in his palm.
“Capital,” he said, then snapped his fingers.
One of Gregor’s entourage stowed her pistol, then hefted a container from the van. She set it down beside her boss and opened the lid, revealing a glowing gemstone the size of a fist. A resplendent matrix of violet light shifted within the gem, visible even without the mech’s magnification. Vaelor took a halting step forward. While his mask concealed his face, there was something eager about his body language, something covetous.
“To your liking then? Interesting trinket. My techs ran any number of tests and couldn’t make heads or tails of it. It doesn’t give off any heat, but has a warping effect on the space around it—perhaps that’s why it’s so damned heavy. They believe it could be anything from a battery to a bomb. I don’t suppose you’d let me know what it does?”
The comment made Vaelor’s head twitch, like a fly had just buzzed past his ear. Slowly, with what seemed like great difficulty, his attention broke from the gem and shifted to Gregor. Another indecipherable telepathic exchange ensued causing a wry smile to form on the dealer’s face. Vealor wouldn’t be pulling back the curtain on his plans before showtime.
A knot formed in Zenith’s stomach as Vaelor moved to pick up the gem. Her eye darted to the scanners, which still showed no signs of an enemy mech. If Vaelor could simply vanish through a black portal, the crew had no hope of capturing him. Her hand shot out to the comms button—ready to call for the attack—but froze as one of Gregor’s goons interposed themselves between Vaelor and the gem.
“Just a moment,” the dealer said with an apologetic smile, “Corr needs to verify the authenticity of the data module you’ve provided. You’ll have your gem in a moment.”
Vaelor stood motionless and unreadable. Something about the posture made Zenith imagine a tempest of ire swirling behind his mask. The dwarf seized the cylinder from Vaelor’s hand and placed it on a tablet. The device pulsed with a rhythmic blue glow then flashed rapidly before going dark. The dwarf frowned and Zenith hit the comms button.
“Adam, it’s about to go off. Move on ‘Go.’”
The dwarf shot an incredulous look to Gregor, who in turn scowled at Vaelor. He lifted a hand and every gun on the roof was simultaneously pointed at the masked man.
“I don’t believe you understand who I am or the consequences of crossing me,” Gregor said through a sneer. “Break his legs and throw him in the van. Some lessons are best taught slowly.”
An alarm blared and a red dot rocketed across Zenith’s scanner. An explosion rocked the roof an instant later, ripping two of the thugs to pieces and sending a third hurtling over the edge. Harlow’s mech sped into view, laying down plasma fire that sent most of the thugs running for cover under the launchpad. Zenith hit the throttle on her mech’s thrusters.
“Go!” She screamed. “Hang on, BOB!”
Adam kicked the door open, slamming it into the dwarf on the other side. The team surged into the fray, Sturdy tagging the downed thug in the chest, then quickly following up with a head shot when he realized the enemy wore body armor. Buddy didn’t miss a beat, picking off the two goons that remained on the north side of the roof. Adam strode forward, assessing the battlefield in the span of a heartbeat.
“Sweep left to the steps, we’re taking out Vaelor,” he commanded as Odybrix soared onto the landing in a streak of pink light. “Or don’t bother with the stairs. You do you.”
Shots flashed through the sky; some bullets and lasers ineffectually plinked off Harlow’s mech, and others—most of them—flew well off the mark. Gregor shouted a command in dwarvish that sent one of his minions scurrying for the van. Gregor stared at the masked man with contempt amidst a hail of fire. His hand whipped to his belt and drew a pistol in a smooth, practiced motion. Three high-intensity lasers ripped into Vaelor’s center of mass, causing him to collapse to his knees as Odybrix stormed towards the pair.
“Hey asshole,” she said, causing Gregor to train the pistol on her. “Not you, dumbass. The guy with a plate for a face.”
“Whatever vendetta you have against this weasel has been settled,” he said, lowering the smoking pistol and pointing. “You’re welcome.”
“This is clearly your first time dealing with him.”
Odybrix’ psionic aura flared as she took telekinetic hold of Vaelor’s crumpled form and launched it into the air. With a downward arc of her arm the body slammed onto the landing pad with a crunch. The black market dealer looked at her as one would a deranged lunatic, tightened his grip on the pistol. She raised her arm again, lifting the body skyward.
“I don’t want to tell you your business, but perhaps the mech threatening to kill us all would be a better target for your rage?”
The body was hurled downward for another bone shattering collision but stopped inches from the ground.
“Ah, so you’re the reasonable type.”
“I’m really not,” Odybrix said, straining.
The air around him vibrated like the plucked string of a guitar. Vaelor’s levitating body twitched and spasmed violently before freezing stock-still. Seemingly oblivious to the crushing psionic field wrapped around him, he rose in the air and rotated until he was upright. His head swiveled to Odybrix and a blithe voice slipped into the minds of everyone nearby—all but Hoxley.
“I applaud your tenacity. With the exception of my wayward kin, I expected you all to perish aboard Levisia. Perhaps your perseverance will see you to the end.”
“The end of what?” Adam yelled, appearing with Buddy, Sturdy and Hoxley in tow.