Horizon Storms - Kevin J. Anderson [22]
“I know where it is, Nikko. I authorized the plans myself.”
Derailed from his story, Nikko blinked. “Well, sometimes I like to…zigzag on my routes. Intentionally, you know.” He sounded defensive. “It doesn’t cost very much ekti, and who knows what I might find? A new settlement, maybe even the Burton?”
“And what did you find this time?”
“You probably remember that my distant uncle Raven Kamarov disappeared a while ago. He used to haul ekti to and from Hurricane Depot, but one day he didn’t show up at his destination. We sent out searchers, but no luck.”
Cesca nodded. A great many Roamer ships had vanished in the past several years, not just Jess Tamblyn’s. It was easy to blame the disappearances on hydrogues, but there was a simmering suspicion among the clans that the Earth Defense Forces were somehow involved. She guessed where Nikko’s story was leading. “And today you located the ship?”
“Not much of it.” Nikko frowned. “But I did find enough serial numbers on hull plates that I could do a proper ID. It’s the right vessel, that’s for sure.”
Cesca felt her stomach sink as if gravity had just increased. “Do you think it could have been a meteor impact or an engine overload?”
His shoulders sagged. “Neither. The marks were unmistakable, Speaker. Some hull sections were large enough that I could see what caused the damage. Jazer strikes. Direct and intentional.”
“Jazers? But only the Eddies use jazers.”
The young man nodded. “I brought all the wreckage with me. It’s in the cargo hold.” The energy traces and blast patterns on the ruined hull metal of Kamarov’s ship would be like a smoking gun.
Anger made Cesca push herself back a bit too quickly for the low gravity of Rendezvous, and her chair hit the wall with a loud bang. “You’re saying that the Eddies intentionally attacked and destroyed an unarmed Roamer vessel?”
“That’s what it looks like. We can do a full analysis, but I’m sure I’m right.”
“This changes everything, Nikko Chan. Ekti is our commodity, to be sold not under duress, but on our own terms, whether the Goose likes it or not.” Cesca drew herself up, assembling her steely resolve. “I need to meet with the clan representatives immediately.”
Chapter 8—DAVLIN LOTZE
His pack loaded with enough supplies for several days, Davlin Lotze stood in front of the flat stone surface of the alien transportal. Hundreds of tiles marked with strange symbols—coordinates for worlds once inhabited by the Klikiss—ringed the device. Most of them were still uninvestigated.
“Mr. Lotze, you are scheduled to return in less than a day,” said the technician at the monitoring station. Known Klikiss transportals, such as this one within the Rheindic Co ruins, were jumping-off points for anyone with the balls and the drive to go planet hunting. Someone like him.
Davlin shouldered his pack. He wore a standard khaki explorer’s jumpsuit of durable fabric that was appropriate for a range of temperatures. Even when he planned to venture to a completely uninhabited world, he wore no garish colors, no jewelry, nothing to call attention to himself. “My mission parameters grant me a certain discretionary latitude in my schedule.” Considering his lengthy service record—not to mention the fact that he and Rlinda Kett had discovered this transportal network and brought the news back to the Hansa—he did not like to follow anyone else’s rules or schedules.
Though the insectlike race had long ago vanished from the Spiral Arm, the Klikiss had left behind a network of mysterious ruins. Since the alien species breathed the same atmosphere and had similar basic biological requirements to those of humans, the Hansa considered those habitable planets to be potential gold mines for colonization, minor victories they could declare in the turmoil of the hydrogue war.
But first those Klikiss worlds had to be identified, catalogued, and superficially explored. Davlin considered the task appropriate to his abilities. Without further delay, he stepped through the blank trapezoidal stone and fell across the universe to another Klikiss world.