Scattered Suns - Kevin J. Anderson [241]
The bruised skies above flickered with the backwash of the battle far, far overhead. Her attention was divided between the chaos outside and the rapid-fire conversations among the Roamer ships. Kotto Okiah and his vessels seemed to be in trouble. The hydrogues had rallied and turned on them. She heard frantic shouts, a crash, then something barely understandable about a...comet?
“Look! It’s changing course by ninety degrees!”
“No comet can—”
“I have to drop us down at six Gs, so I hope I don’t crack a rib. Hang on.”
“Look out!”
A long pause and then, “There goes another warglobe—it popped like a faceplate meeting a sledgehammer. We’re safe enough for now.”
“That comet thing must be on our side. The drogues aren’t very good at making friends.”
“Could be their personality. Or their conversational skills.”
Sensing something from the trees, Solimar stared out at the rustling, agitated forest and then up into the sky, his face alight with awed anticipation. “Celli, come here! You’ll want to see this.”
Below, the Beneto golem stood in the middle of the clearing, wooden arms outstretched, and all the trees seemed to be straining with him. “The wentals!” he called out, sounding as surprised as the rest of the Therons. “The wentals are still alive! And they have come!”
Out in space, Jess Tamblyn’s supercharged wental comet plunged toward Theroc. Trailing discarded ionized gases in a long plume, the living projectile homed in on its ancient enemies. The comet struck the atmosphere, screaming as it began to burn up, but never slowing as it hurtled toward the last of the attacking warglobes.
Celli watched the hydrogue ships congregate high over the fungus-reef city. The aliens clustered in a defensive formation and launched concentrated webs of blue lightning, but nothing could stop the supercharged celestial object. At the last instant, the diamond spheres scattered, hoping to offer a less cohesive target.
In response the comet itself fragmented. The frozen chunks separated like individual warheads, flying toward the remaining warglobes. Each fragment shifted, crackling with an inner light. Sonic booms thundered through the air, followed by massive explosions as each cometary shard hammered into a hydrogue ship.
Vanquished, the broken warglobes split apart, and the wreckage fell crashing to the forest. Vengeful verdani folded over, bending to fetter the remnants of their enemies’ ships with lashing fronds. With a relentless grip, the iron-hard trees completed the destruction.
Her face turned toward the sky, Celli discovered she was crying and laughing at the same time, unable to believe what had happened. Solimar hugged her. “All the warglobes are destroyed! The Roamers defeated the other ones out in space.” He paused, obviously receiving a message through telink. “No...two warglobes have escaped. One is damaged.” He grabbed her by the waist and swung her around. “But we’re saved.”
Idriss and Alexa could not believe what they were hearing. Gasping and laughing with giddy disbelief, Celli said, “Come on, let’s go down to the forest.”
Amazed Therons gathered in relief and gratitude as they realized that the worldforest had been rescued again—this time not by fiery elemental beings, but by a strange living comet. And the Roamers.
Overhead, where the ice mountain had disintegrated, clouds of vapor spread out. The flash-melted residue from the wental comet drifted to the ground in droplets of exotic rain. Green priests met in the clearing. Celli and Solimar ran to stand by her uncle Yarrod.
The rain came down in a gentle fall, invigorating and alive. The pleasant dampness made Celli’s flesh tingle. Wental-charged droplets moistened the ash-strewn ground of Theroc and infused the soil with new life.
As Celli watched, her mouth open in surprise, curling shoots, pale leaves, and stalks sprouted from seeds and