Chapter 19

Sophia was a whirlwind of fury as she rushed through the Warlock's forward cabin, scooping up what few tools had been left out and throwing them into the nearest compartment. Then she slammed herself down into the pilot's chair, her hands shaking with rage as she started the Warlock's initialization sequence. The navigational coordinate system hesitated, and she drew in a hissing breath to steady her temper before shutting the system down and turning on the refrigeration unit in one of the storage compartments.

It was a completely nonsensical thing to do, unless you knew that the systems in a vanship were mostly wired in series and that the refrigeration unit was before the navigational coordinate system in that series.

She flicked the switch for the navigational coordinate system and this time it came smoothly online, but there were other problems. One of the pilot's consoles showed various lights blinking warnings about incomplete or damaged systems, but there was enough to get the Warlock off the flight deck and away from the Silvana. She would not sit still and allow anyone to betray her. She would not wait for any assassin to come kill her.

Sophia looked hard at one particular warning light on the pilot's console. It reminded her that she had never remembered to refill the impact foam reservoirs. Too late now. She ignored Banks' voice on the comm while she diverted Claudia from the backup systems to the propulsion system.

And there was Banks appearing on her secondary viewscreen. The primary viewscreen was still without power. She could see him shouting as she disengaged the locks and gave the Warlock's propulsion a brief surge of Claudia that sent the ship hurtling backward. What little Claudia now remained in the Warlock's systems would have to be saved until the very last second.

When the Warlock hit the lip that separated the flight deck from the sky, she drew a slow breath. Then she let it out as a soft sound of dread as the Warlock started to fall.

"Captain, the Warlock has left the Silvana and gone into a spin! It's not carrying any fuel!"

"That crazy bitch just pushed her ship off the flight deck!"

Bren heard both the report from the watchman and the shout from Banks over his comm at the same time. He knew in that moment that he'd judged Sophia wrong. She was reasonable, but only up to a point.

He was already heading for the lift at a run when he flicked open his comm to access all decks. "Emergency. Clear all comms. Navigation, all stop. I want any pilots near the docks to lift off and save the Warlock from crashing. Do whatever you have to. Doctor Gareck, report to the docks as soon as possible. Prepare for crash injuries. The pilot is type A positive. Doctor's Aides; pack up everything in the med bay and prepare to move. Engineering, I want you to load it all on a plane and get it down on the ground. Someone get me Pilot Forrester on the comm."

He stopped his run by the simple expedient of slamming into the back of the lift with his shoulder before spinning and punching the button for the bridge. He closed his comm down to a single frequency and listened to the controlled chaos happening around him.

"I've got her." Bren heard Miller's voice, then he could hear the Warlock's systems reverberate in the ship's tiny cabin as they clicked and beeped and blared and announced impending doom. The wind could be heard even through the canopy. Sophia herself was silent.

"Use what fuel you've got left. I have ships heading for you to slow your descent." He said, his voice as calm as he could make it.

"Go to hell, Bren." Sophia's voice was not calm. Even those few words were spat out from between her teeth. He could hear switches flipping as she struggled to keep the plane level.

There was another click, and a neutral tone from his comm that meant the channel had been closed to incoming messages. Sophia would no longer hear anything he said. The lift doors opened up on the bridge, and Bren found himself staring at his first officer, who had her fingers on the collar of her uniform, hovering over the comm button.

"She's cut off reception." Miller reported faintly, and Bren nodded.

"Link all channels to my ready room. I'll monitor from there." He strode past her and slammed the door of his ready room closed behind him, dropping down into a chair still wearing shorts and a shirt from his time on the health deck.

Reports started coming in, too fast for him to identify the person making them.

"I've got the ship in my sights now."

"Doctor Gareck is packed and ready to go."

"The Warlock's been sighted, Captain. She's holding steady, but dropping like a stone. We've got two ships flanking her, but they can't get close enough at those speeds. They'll kill themselves and her too."

Bren responded to the report directed at him. "Received. She won't slow until she's close to the ground. Keep as close as you can, and bring the doctor in the moment the Warlock touches down." He flogged his brain for anything else he could do to make the Warlock land safely, any trick to the Warlock's operation that would give Sophia the Claudia she needed. But there was nothing. Claudia was finite, and the Warlock ran on Claudia, not his wishes.

Bren put his head in his hands and listened to the Warlock crashing.

If he concentrated over the other reports, he could hear Sophia's rapid breathing. She never said a word, but she was never idle, either. He could hear the changes as differences in the way the wind screamed over the canopy as she tried every trick she knew. He couldn't recognize each as it flashed through her mind and her hands, but he knew she was a good mechanic, and she was desperate.

Only near the end did she speak, and it was a whisper. "Damn you, Bren."

He closed his eyes, accepting the curse as his due. Then she cried out sharply, and he kept his eyes closed, his body still as a stone. Now he could hear her breathing, a rasping draw that was punctuated with 'god'.