Timothy Zahn - Dragon and Thief

"Not very well," Jack told him. "Just keep your fingernails crossed."

"Pardon?"

"Skip it," Jack said, scooping up Dumbarton's slapstick and stuffing it through the back of his belt where it would be handy if he needed it. Or, more likely, if Draycos needed it. "Come on."

They reached the top of the ridge without seeing or hearing anyone else and started down. Here, outside the crash zone, the forest was alive with color, bright reds and yellows splashed against more subdued blues and blue-greens. Spindly bushes shared space with the thick-trunked trees, along with the curly-fry grass that seemed to grow everywhere on this part of Iota Klestis. Here and there Jack caught a glimpse of a bird or large insect flying about on its own business.

"Is that your ship?" Draycos murmured as Jack crouched down behind one of the bushes and gave the area a quick study. "The group of bushes at the far edge of the clearing against a line of trees?"

"That's it," Jack said sourly. "Only it's not supposed to be that easy to see."

It certainly wasn't to him, anyway. To his eyes, the Essenay's outline was only barely visible along the edges of what seemed to be a group of bushes and grasses swaying gently in the breeze. The only reason he could see it at all was because he knew exactly where to look.

So naturally Draycos, freshly arrived in the Orion Arm and who knew nothing about anything, had picked it out of the background without a second glance. So much for the big, fancy chameleon hull-wrap Uncle Virgil had installed two years ago.

"It is quite well concealed," Draycos assured him. "My eyes accept slightly different wavelengths of light than yours do, and your camouflage does not exactly duplicate them. Also, as a warrior, I am trained to search for hidden objects."

"A handy talent," Jack growled. "Let's just hope our buddies back there don't include anyone like you."

Still no one in sight. Either they were all off searching a different part of the forest, or they'd already found the Essenay and were lying in ambush for whoever might show up there.

Either way, there was nothing to be gained by sitting here waiting. "Okay, we're going whole hog," he muttered to Draycos. "Hang on."

Taking a deep breath, he gathered his feet under him and sprinted toward the ship.

If there was an ambush waiting, it was a rotten one. No one shot at him as he slipped between the trees and pounded into the open area of the clearing. He kept going, hoping he wouldn't catch a foot on something hidden in the grass and end up face-first on the ground.

He was about thirty feet from the Essenay when the airlock hatch slid open and the gangway extended itself outward. Jack braced himself, wondering if that was the signal the hidden attackers had been waiting for.

But there was still no reaction from the surrounding forest. A second later he was charging up the gangway, ducking his head under the hatchway, trying to skid to a halt before he slammed full-tilt into the bulkhead on the far side of the narrow airlock.

Draycos had already anticipated the problem. Again, the sudden telltale weight appeared on his chest as Draycos came up and off him, putting all four legs straight out in front of Jack like gold-scaled shock absorbers to help absorb the impact.

Between the four K'da legs and two human arms, they bounced safely together off the bulkhead. "Close the hatch," Jack snapped as he regained his balance. Draycos dropped all the way off him, his long neck swiveling around as he checked things out. "Uncle Virge?" Jack called again.

"All right, all right, I'm not deaf," Uncle Virge said, his voice sounding odd as the hatch slid closed. "I take it this is your new friend?"

"Draycos, meet Uncle Virge," Jack said, slapping the door pad. The inner hatch slid open, and he headed forward at a dead run. A glance over his shoulder showed Draycos was right behind him.

He reached the cockpit, tossed his leather jacket and the slapstick in a corner, and slid into the pilot seat. The preflight had been done, he saw, and Uncle Virge had computed an ECHO course for use once they were outside the atmosphere.

The weapons panel, he noted with decidedly mixed feelings, had also been activated. Uncle Virgil had taught him how to use it, but he'd never even had to turn it on, let alone actually shoot at anyone.

"How may I best serve?" Draycos asked. He was standing behind Jack on his back paws, his body stretched upward with his front paws braced on the back of the chair. His pointed snout was swinging back and forth over Jack's shoulder as he studied the controls.

"You can't," Jack said, getting a grip on the Y-shaped control yoke. "This is a one-man operation. Hang onto something; here we go."

Without waiting for a reply, he threw power to the antigrav lifters. The Essenay shuddered once, then lurched up and out of the clearing. They cleared the trees, Jack switched over from the lifters to the main drive, and they were off.

As the ship headed up through the drifting smoke, he felt a brief weight on his shoulders, then nothing. The dragon had found something to hang onto, all right. Him.

"They will send ships to intercept," Draycos warned from Jack's right shoulder. "Is this vessel armed?"

"Right here," Jack said, letting go of the yoke with his left hand long enough to tap the weapons panel. Getting a two-handed grip on the yoke again, he turned the Essenay into a tight right-hand curve. "We've got two meteor-defense lasers and a short-range particle-beam shredder. And four small missile launchers."

"Jack!" Uncle Virge protested. "The missiles are privileged information, lad."

"What, you think he's not going to notice when we fire them?" Jack retorted.

"Instruct me in its operation," the dragon said, the top of his head rising up out of Jack's skin for a better look.

Jack shook his head. "No, that's all right," he said, risking a quick look at the aft sensor display. Was that a small ship rising from the forest near the wrecked freighter?

"Instruct me in its operation," Draycos insisted. "I am a warrior of the K'da—"

"Yeah, yeah, I remember," Jack cut him off. No, it wasn't a small ship coming up from the forest. It was two small ships. Terrific. "No offense, but so far all I've seen you do is grab other people's weapons. Any good pickpocket could do that."

"Have you ever engaged in combat?" Draycos countered. "Have you ever flown this spacecraft in combat?"

"No, and no," Jack ground out. Already the two ships were gaining on him. Fighter-sized, he could see now. Probably fighter-armed, too. "Now shut up and let me fly. This is hard enough as it is."

In answer, his open shirt was suddenly shoved back off his left shoulder, and a pair of golden legs sprouted from his skin there. "Hey!" he snapped as the unexpected weight translated into a brief wobble of the control yoke. "Watch it!"

"You cannot fly and defend together," Draycos said firmly, the extended paws poised over the weapons panel. "You are not trained, and these controls are not well laid out. Now instruct me."

Jack muttered a word that had once cost him a week of desserts. To trust his life to someone else, and an alien newcomer at that...

But the dragon was right. Besides, he could hardly be any worse at this than Jack was. "All right, fine," he said, trying to coax a little more speed out of the engines. "The left section handles targeting. The way you work it..."

The quick course took a minute and a half, about the same time it took the two fighters to close to firing range. Jack could only hope the dragon was a quick study.

"Interesting," Draycos commented as the fighters approached. "They are using a classic chiv-nez maneuver."

"I guess word gets around," Jack said, squeezing the control yoke hard as he studied the aft display. The fighters weren't going to wait long before making their move, he knew. Probably deciding how best to disable the Essenay without blowing it completely out of the sky.