Peter Telep - Pilgrim stars

She had directed her question to Tolwyn, but Bellegarde jumped all over it. "Why weren't we informed of your decision to allow the Pilgrims to build a hopper drive?"

"Richard, this is neither the time nor the-"

"I think it is," Bellegarde boldly corrected. "I think the space marshal owes us an explanation-and an apology."

Gregarov lifted a derisive grin. "I heard you weren't much of a diplomat, Mr. Bellegarde. I got a taste of that in the wardroom, but now I really see what they mean. Guess the bottle can do that."

He opened his mouth to launch a retort.

"You can't blame this crisis on me," she went on. "But you have no conception of the forces at work here."

"Then educate me."

"I'm sorry, but I'm not at liberty to divulge that information."

"Ma'am?" Tolwyn said, slipping between them. "It's highly likely that Aristee will get that drive modified and head back to Earth to create a gravity well that will consume planet. The Tiger Claw and the Fosubius battle group are already standing by there. I've left the Oregon and Mitchell Hammock at Nether-anya. We'll join the Claw and post our battle group here to maintain the no-fly zone."

Gregarov swung her head toward the holograph gleaming above them. "When you look at the stars like this, they seem… I don't know… deceptive. You don't realize that billions of people are out there living on those dots." She faced Tolwyn, her eyes welling up. "geoff, you have to believe me when I say I didn't know so many would die. None of us did."

"You gambled. You lost. Now the bill's come due." Tolwyn raised a brow, then hustled toward the hatch.

"Next time gamble with your own life." Bellegarde didn't wait for her reply. He double-timed into Tolwyn's shadow, leaving Gregarov alone with her remorse.

Which wouldn't change a damned thing now.

Never before had Admiral Vukar watched so many brave warriors plummet to their deaths. The Pilgrims had squeezed their organs or had forced them to gouge out their eyes or even their hearts. The mutated apes had dishonored him and his clan on a scale once unimaginable. A single dreadnought escorted his flagship now, a single dreadnought depleted of its fighters.

They continued pursuing the supercruiser, and Tactical Officer Makorshk had twice during the past fourteen standard days led a team charged with lightening their load and increasing their velocity. Perhaps they could narrow the gap enough to make one last assault on the supercruiser. Still, during their last strike, they had thought that the Pilgrims with telekinetic-like powers would be recovering from destroying the cruisers; he and Makorshk had not figured that more Pilgrims waited in reserve, and those fanatical apes had effortlessly plucked his last cruiser and the destroyer from the sky.

At the moment, more Pilgrims could be standing by, waiting for them to make a move. No, Vukar would not recklessly throw away his warriors' lives, despite the honor of dying in battle and the heat of the blood frenzy that left him tense and sweating at the end of each day. There had to be a way to disable that lone ship and take possession without springing the enemy's trap.

"Kalralahr?"

Vukar stirred in his meditation chair, then reached to the comm display's control panel. Makorshk stared back at him, the folds of his face loose and forming an expression of despair. "We've jettisoned the last from engineering and crew's quarters, but we've only brought velocity up to one-two-nine KPS. The drive's beginning to superheat. The Kot'Akri reports the same. Our prey continues to lead by nearly one hundred and eighty thousand kilometers. Ion emissions remain stable. We have a distinct trail."

"But we won't get close enough to launch another ship-to-ship assault. It is a physical impossibility."

"Yes, but we do have two weapons left. Our fighters and our Skipper missiles. We've given the Pilgrims too much time already. They'll jump soon. We're at maximum velocity and as close as we'll get. The time has come."

Vukar drew nutrient gas through his broad nostrils and exhaled in a burst. "If we send fighters, they'll simply kill our pilots with their minds. And if we launch Skipper missiles, we won't disable the ship-we'll destroy it. Perhaps no one is meant to have that drive."

"It may take a few hours, but we can replace the warheads in our Skippers with low-level explosives and program them to lock on to ion engines. The photon cloaks should help to get them close enough. Fighter interdiction will be the Pilgrims' only way to stop them."

"What makes you believe our Skippers can evade their counter-assault?"

"We can launch our fighters to keep theirs busy. We outnumber them nearly three-to-one. But most of our pilots won't make it back. They'll either run out of fuel or exceed the ten-hour life support limit."

"Or have their hearts crushed, their eyes torn out."

"We have no defense against that, but we cannot shame ourselves and our clan. If we die, we die with honor. Perhaps you believe that you've already sent too many of the hrai to their deaths. But Kalralahr, not a single life was wasted-all fought with honor until the end. So should we."

"You sound more like an elder than a tactical officer," Vukar mused. "It seems you've found your way in a changing universe. And you remind me of my own."

"Kalralahr, I knew that one day we would embrace in death. Whether it be here or on the challenge ground hardly matters. Know that I've despised you to the core. But you have done something no other officer would: you let me speak, and you listened. For that, I owe you my life, and there is no one else more worthy to receive it."

Vukar scrutinized the young warrior, probing for insincerity but discovering only a stalwart commitment to the words. Makorshk had come a long way, and Vukar felt even more justified in delaying the challenge. "Give the order. Modify our Skipper missiles. Prepare our fighters for launch. I'll be here or in my quarters. Alert me when the time comes."

Makorshk bowed and reached to end the link. Leaning back in his meditation chair, Vukar considered what he would do if this final assault failed. Any other kalralahr would not entertain the possibility of life after such a disgrace. Vukar's duty would be to return home and commit zu'kara before the clan elders. But Makorshk's sense of independence had become infectious, and Vukar suddenly believed that failure should not cost him his life…

"After all of this, after all that's happened, we've changed nothing."

Blair sat on the edge of the cot and glanced idly around the sick bay. He had spent the past two weeks recovering with the others in the long room lined with too many bunks and filled with too many nasty smells. His body temperature had dropped five degrees and hadn't risen for nearly ten days. A non-Pilgrim might have died from such a long period at hypothermic levels, but Blair's physiology had kept him alive. Barely. He finally turned to Karista, who sat next to him and stared blankly across the room. "Did you hear what I said?"

She nodded. "Sounds like you've given up."

"What else can we do? She's getting her hopper drive ready as we speak. How are we supposed to stop that while we're under guard?" He raised his head toward the two Marines posted just outside the open hatch.

"I don't know." She stood with a sigh of frustration. "Today they're moving you back to the brig. Our esteemed captain gave me the honor of escorting you. I almost wish she had killed me. Maybe she already has. The guilt… it's a slow poison. I tossed away everything I believed in."

"No, you didn't."

"The others needed me during the attack. While I was helping you, I was also back in. Some of them were like you-they wanted to feel too much. They would've died."

"Why did you wait so long to tell me?"