First Contact Fallout by Aer-ki Jyr (novels for teenagers .TXT) 📗

at the other three sets of Zen’zat helmets through his own. Tu’vac must survive.

Survive how if we lose the planet? Why wasn’t he evacuated earlier?

Was there a safer place than this to send him?

Somewhere not being invaded, Ben’ra pointed out.

The spacelanes are being hunted by J’gar interceptors. Anything less than a battlegroup isn’t safe to move around with. Believe me, we wanted to move him, but there weren’t any good options and this Zor’do had the only equipment that could treat him.

Explain that, Jo’ra insisted, but they didn’t have time. The proximity sensors they’d left on several of the buildings picked up scout drone activity just before they were blasted offline.

Survive and ask me later. This is where we part, he said, reaching out a hand and putting it on Jo’ra’s shoulder. Disappear, he ordered.

As instructed Jo’ra’s body disappeared from view, for he was wearing specialized scout armor with a cloaking device. He couldn’t fight with it active, but now they didn’t need to. They needed to run, and soon the other two Zen’zat disappeared as well, with Mario’topa giving them a head start, for none were transmitting even the faint identification signals for each other to pick up, and he didn’t want to trip over them by accident.

He took one last look at the quiet night sky as the first lightening was beginning to appear on the horizon. The stars were still visible overhead, but amongst them were the enemy warships ringing the planet outside of Holloi’s attack range. Any ship trying to leave the planet would be intercepted by them, and unless what was left of the Era’tran fleet beneath the shields came out to fight a blocking action no one was getting out of here alive.

But Holloi was a big planet, and even if the enemy took down all the shield generators a single Zen’zat with scout armor could disappear here indefinitely…so long as he didn’t run out of supplies or power. Mario’topa much preferred direct combat, but this war couldn’t be won by killing more Bo’ja. It was going to take something far greater than that. And Tu’vac was the only chance he figured the empire had of surviving. Without him, they were doomed to either death by Itaru or death by Hadarak.

Mario’topa had to catch up to him, but first he had to figure out which way he’d gone, and that meant finding the tracks on the perimeter that the large bipeds had no way to conceal on the semi-soft ground…

4

“Here,” Sol’an said as her visual navigational display brought them to a grove of trees too tight for an Era’tran to fit inside, but her Pef’bar could already see the cargo canisters stashed between the various gaps. “Our supplies.”

Tu’vac tried to reach out with his mind and touch them, but it was as if his ability to do so was merely a figment of his imagination.

“How are we to get them out?”

“I can,” she said, telekinetically pulling on one and dragging it over another before rolling it across a branch and letting it fall to the ground. Her Lachka wasn’t strong enough to fully lift it, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t maneuver them around into the clear. Sol’an also used her invisible ability to open the seal on it and reveal trays of food cubes. She broke out several and floated them towards Tu’vac.

“Eat,” she said, but he would not open his mouth.

“I can feed myself. Set them down.”

The food cubes floated to the ground and stacked themselves there, soon to be joined by others as the healer added more from the container to the pile building on top of the moist soil. Tu’vac knelt beside it and reached down with his right hand, picking up several in his palm before standing up again and flicking them into the air above his head.

He tilted it to the side and let them fall between the two halves of his mouth, then he clamped shut before they could pass out the other side again. Tu’vac righted himself and chewed for a moment before swallowing and looking at her.

“What is wrong?”

“I’ve never seen you eat like that before.”

“How did I eat before?”

“You licked them up with your tongue or bit them out of the suspended air racks.”

“I do not feel like licking the ground,” he said, grabbing a few more and tossing them up again. His aim was spot on, and not a one of them fell past his bite.

“We have traveled far longer than you have done before. You need food and rest. I will keep watch.”

“We will split the watch,” he differed.

“No, you must sleep.”

“Why?”

“If you overload your mind may seize up, and I don’t have the proper equipment to treat you.”

“Explain.”

“If your mind reaches for something it can’t access and keeps trying repeatedly you will get stuck in an unfulfilled loop and not be able to do anything else. It has happened many times before and requires a treatment. I cannot give you that here.”

Tu’vac ate another handful of food cubes. “So you are saying that I will become helpless if I do not rest?”

“It may happen even if you do. We had no choice but to run from the Zor’do. I am just trying to keep us alive as long as possible. I do not know what to do.”

“Will I come out of the loop eventually?”

“I have never let you linger enough to know. Unlocking the thought you were trying to access was the preferred course of dealing with the malfunction.”

“Am I not to think?”

“Try not to focus on anything you don’t already know.”

“I am unsure how to do that.”

“I know, Tu’vac. I know. Do your best.”

“My best is not the objective. What else is in this dead drop?”