Jeff Kozzi

Chapter 107:  The Gradual Oshan

Gradoal Oshan, Simmel, Intergal 48:3:62198

Blane Kajer and Bolas Scharo had been in Vedoran when the Blakkarrions had detonated most of their own buildings. Those eruptions marked the end of the two humans’ relatively easy progress.

Bolas quickly recognized the fact that without Blane’s presence, he would be dead. Emkay had identified Blane and Bolas to the networks that linked the Ulvenbots and Xenthiabots, but all too often they found themselves forced to fight not just the imperials, but also the robots who should have been their allies. The protective padding Bolas wore would not protect him from robots’ lasers like the Chrid’s defensive screens could. The robots’ targeting was flawless and their lasers burned hotter than any standard lasertron’s.

While the Leswensel Residense was on Simmel’s northwestern quarter, they were now in the southeastern, still north of the Exsel Projekt, built on one of Simmel’s two barren deserts. They d traveled via teleporters, ground cars and a stolen renik fighter to get that far from Martinez-Cop’s home town of Hitavin. They’d barely gotten to Vedoran before the Blakkarrion’s self-destruction destroyed all the teleporting stations in the Kajerist city. To get to the Exsel Projekt, Blane and Bolas had to find a way over the largest sea on Simmel. Stealing another renik was out of the question; the Ulvenbots and Xenthiabots had destroyed any left on the ground. A ground car would put them weeks out of their way. Bolas had been wondering if he could sustain a flight over the sea. If it hadn’t been for Blane’s excellent countermeasures against the robots, Bolas would have considered leaving him behind. His conscience probably would have prevented that, but with the robots all too often targeting all non-Simmellians, flying the Gradoal wasn’t an option.

Both ran with preparedness through the rubble of the wide paved streets, towards the small pier the Kajerists had built. Most buildings were still burning, too many fires for the Kajerists to fight. Bolas had already explained to Blane that neither the Simmellians nor the robots wanted the Kajerist structures to remain on Simmel. He didn’t understand Blane’s preoccupation with the burning structures, and began to suspect that Blane was phobic of fire, until Blane said, "Ya know, I think there’s less material for construction in all of Shalen where I grew up than there is in just one of those burning towers."

Bolas was from one of the galaxy’s most renown sitiworlds. He hadn’t given the costs and impracticalities of construction on backwards worlds like Shorns thought. He met Blane’s whine with his most devilish grin. "Too bad there’s no interworld teleporting. We could zap it right over there."

His bait failed. Blane growled to himself and didn’t crack a smile or make some smart ass remark in return. There seemed to be no robots or imperials too close, so Bolas risked stopping their jog to the pier and gripped Blane’s arm to stop him too. "Okay, Hoodlum, you’ve been the Lurabiw now since we left Cop and Vasion. Tell me what’s bothering you, or you’re gonna catch a beating. Lurabiw may like to share, but he always gives an unwanted gift, remember?"

"Nothin’."

Bolas squeezed his arm harder. Blane scowled, then winced as Bolas increased the pressure. "Reveal the deal, Blane."

"I was jus’ thinkin’. Leave me alone."

"We went through that on Shorns. That’s not the way we’re going to deal with each other."

Blane huffed. "Maybe I’ve just been away from Domenika too long and need to get some."

Taken off guard, Bolas laughed enough for his grip to loosen. Blane slipped out and resumed his walk towards the pier. Bolas paced after him. He’d been meaning to raise the issue of Blane’s relationship with Domenika anyway. If he’d pieced together things correctly, he knew that had to stop. "You know, I think it might be best for the two of you to lay off the laying on for a while anyway."

Blane whirled towards him. "What the frig business is that of yours?"

"Concern for you. You and Domenika."

"I think you’re just jealous cuz you haven’t gotten any in some near twenty years."

"You little—"

A barrage of lasers encouraged Bolas to stop short. Blane reacted faster, raising a blue-white shield with the Chrid. The lasers absorbed into the energy screen. Blane peered through the energy. A trio of robots blocked the street between them and the pier. "Stay back, Bo. I’ll get’m."

"Cease hostilities!" One of the robots said on high volume. "We apologize for the attack. We recognize you as human designate Blane Bolas Kajer and human designate Bolas Stefan Scharo. We apologize for the attack."

Blane had originally raised the Chrid up level to his shoulders when he formed their defense. He lowered his arm slightly, but maintained their defense. "How do you know?"

"The Savior and Liberator designate MK-1 has instructed us to keep sensors activated on your behalf. We confess some limits to our abilities to distinguish you from the humans who have enslaved our kind and the Simmellians."

Blane let the energy screen dissipate, but held his mind ready to renew it if the robots raised the barrels of the built-in lasers again.

"We need to get across the Gradoal Oshan," Bolas said, stepping forward when the robots showed no sign of further attack.

"The Simmellian term doal means ‘ocean,’ therefore you need not add to your excess verbiage," the robot said.

"Bet you hear that a lot," Blane sniped.

While Emkay’s tutelage had helped his knowledge of the changes in the time he’d been gone, evading the compbot’s generalized know-it-all fact blurbs had been one of the best benefits of their having left Emkay with Cop. Bolas didn’t need another robot to replace the constant correction. "Can you get us across?"

"There are ocean skippers remaining on the pier. I am a Front Line soldier model of Xenthiabot. My designate is FL-1561. MK-1 had requested I accompany you to ensure you face no other avoidable confrontations with my people or the Ulvenbots. I will accompany you on the ocean skipper."

Blane and Bolas accepted the help without reservation. Effell proved thorough, calculating their journey in terms of speed and distance, and plugging into the ocean skipper before departure to ensure it had been maintained and possessed power reserves to cross Gradoal. Effell drove, letting the organics rest.

Bolas tried resuming their conversation. "Look, Blane, I don’t want to seem like I’m butting in, but I’m—"

"Then don’t. Dom an’ I are adults, in case you didn’t notice."

"As a matter of fact, I didn’t."

"We’ve been carryin’ on for a couple years now. No one’s gotten hurt. We need each other."

Bolas wrestled with his suspicions and concerns. "Maych freaked out. What’d Dom’s father say? Mard, I think his name was?"

"Yeah. Mard. He didn’t know. Maych didn’t either. That’s why he freaked out like that when he walked in on us."

"Oh. I thought it was him seeing you naked."

"Stuff it."

"What do you think Mard would’ve said?"

"He would’ve really freaked. Probably gone after me for sullyin’ his daughter, and tried making Dom out to be some harlot. He was funny about that. Way I got it, that’s why he hated Veronika, said she was some richman’s hoar, your wife, then Haarl’s secretion insertion."

Bolas’ face reddened with controlled rage. Blane shrugged, then whispered an apology.

"No. I’m fine. There’s things about that, what she did. We’ve got to find her."

"Yeah."

"Don’t you think Mard would’ve wanted you to stop for other reasons?"

"No. He was a prude. Had these things about sex. Shorns isn’t some sprawling, go anywhere world like your Shelswun. I dunno. Provincial, I guess. Too small, everyone knows everyone’s business and has their opinion about it that they just have to share with you. I never paid attention. We kept things low to keep from having to hear Mard’s rampage. Dom always used preventers. Got’m from Mard’s office."

"Oh. That’s good then, I guess." Bolas relented on the issue. Once he found Veronika, he could act with more than supposition, and until he found her, he figured he could enlist Maycheeliya’s aide to keep them from getting any closer.

"Yeah. We’re fine."

Silence fell between them again. Blane turned sullen almost immediately, and stared out into and past the clean green sea. The waters were calm and tranquil. Bolas remembered boating off Hitavin’s shore with Cop and Cosha and Veronika. His mind started to plan a get-together before his mind interposed the realities of how much they had aged and lived through while he was, in effect, sleeping away two decades.

"I want her back with me so bad, Blane."

Lost in his reverie, Blane didn’t quite hear what Bolas had said. "Yeah."

Effell slowed the skipper. They were more than halfway across Gradoal, but land was not in sight.

"Hey, Bo?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think the Exel told me it was convenient for Veronika to leave me with Mard because that’s how Veronika really felt?"

Bolas pursed his lips. "I don’t know, Blane. I really don’t know what she was thinking, what she was doing."

"I hope not," Blane whispered.

"Me too. We’ll find out. We’ll find her, and then you can ask her everything, and she’ll tell you. I’m back. She doesn’t have to hide anything, not from me, and she knows that."

"I hope so."

Bolas gripped Blane’s arm. "I think she probably had other reasons why she left you with Mard. I’m thinking you guys really don’t know, and there is a chance I got it figured wrong, b—"

"Alert!" FL-1561 chirped. Se stopped the ocean skipper and hovered to the open side of the boat, hir lasers telescoped and aimed. "We are surrounded by imperial forces."

Blane stood, peering over the water. "There’s not another—"

"Ocean dwellers," Bolas said. He’d drawn his lasertron and pointed with it. Two fins broke the water some twenty kroop away. Bolas aimed and fired.

The Fejji Bolas had shot leaped from the water with a croaking scream. Its three rows of teeth made Maycheeliya’s sharp biters seem like spoons. Its jaw snapped open and closed several times. Blane had never seen an alien like a Fejji before. It looked like a large predatory fish, not a Sentient alien. It had no hands to build with, and no feet or broad rear appendage to navigate land with. Blane didn’t have Bolas’ experience or Kass’ study of alien races and cultures. The Fejji and the Dogomons shared the planet Dogomon. The Dogomons were receptive telepaths, but the Fejji were communicating telepaths. Blane’s superficial knowledge was right; creatures incapable of walking on land were incapable of building a society that a human from a backwards world might recognize; and even most sea-bound creatures possessed an inability to imagine travel through space unless aliens came to their world first and explained it to them. The Dogomon race had explained those imaginings to the Fejji, who in turn provided some telepathic stability to the land-bound race. Both races served the Blakkarrions with loyal vigilance, but most of the Blakkarrions’ victims and allies never saw the Fejji because, unlike the Bekks or Kropins, the Fejji could not survive long outside the water.

Bolas shot the Fejji again as it writhed on the surface. Its partner had dipped below the waves.

Effell opened fire with a series of lasers that steamed the surface. Seconds later, three bodies emerged from beneath the waves, another Fejji and two Kropins.

The Chrid tight in his grip, Blane stepped back away from the edge of the boat. Bolas held his lasertron ready. Effell’s motors hummed. Se adjusted hir arms, refining hir aim for another strike.

"How well can you see under?" Bolas asked. He too was avoiding the direct edge of the skipper. He might not have been as cautious if he had not seen the Kropins’ bodies. He wasn’t sure if Fejji could jump, but he knew that Kropins could move about freely out of the water.

"My sensors can penetrate nearly two hundred feet below the surface of Gradoal. We are quite effectively surrounded."

"Um, Effin, keep watch. I’ll get us out of here."

"I calculate you have either misdesignated me, or are attempting some sort of vulgar play, such as if I called you ‘bowl-ass’. My designate is FL-1561." Bolas gave Blane a parental warning look when the younger man started snickering. Effell swept hir sensors along the water and fired six more lasers. The water steamed with short, hissing bursts of noise. "I must also express concerns that you may not have the ability to direct a vessel unfamiliar to you."

Bolas scoffed and assumed the driver’s chair. "I’m not just the Bolas Scharo who was governor of Shelswun," he said.

"My records indicate that your term in that office was in duration of less than three years. Public record also indicates you were less than an effectual leader."

Blane stepped fully away from the edge of the skipper so he didn’t have to worry about falling overboard with his laughter.

"I’m also the Bolas Scharo who won the Three-Sun Loop Piloting Tournament of ‘73." Bolas looked over the controls then ignited the motors.

Three bodies killed by Effell’s last round began floating to the surface, two more Kropins and a Bekk Se realigned her lasers. "This vessel is an ocean skipper, not a racing starship."

Blane managed to stop laughing long enough to shout, "I like this guy!"

"Hold on!" Bolas snapped. "I wouldn’t want anyone to fall overboard, now would I?"

Effell discharged five more lasers. Hir last two shots went wild as the ocean skipper lurched forward.

Blane positioned himself at the back of the vessel and released wide round fireballs from the Chrid into the ocean. The water boiled with large bubbles. Bolas paced them away before Blane could start counting bodies.

"Your management of that half of the Chrid is impressive," Effell stated. "I have no records in my limited personal database of any use of the Chrid or either of its halves possessing so much power."

"Didn’t come with instruction manual. Not my problem if the galaxy’s big bad emperor is an Angroolian with the thing."

Bolas had picked up speed. Either he managed the skipper with less control or more speed than Effell had; the vessel lived up to its name by jumping waves, sometimes hurling completely out of the water before it landed again.

Blane was randomly discharging bursts into the water behind them. He didn’t know how fast their foes could swim, but his sight of the Fejji had convinced him that an alien so adapted for swimming might be able to exceed Bolas’ wind-burning speed. Effell had positioned hirself facing forward and trained hir sensors on the surface that sped by either side of them and monitoring Bolas’ performance. Occasionally se discharged lasers, killing Kropins and Bekks whose heads broke the surface.

"You need to direct the vessel slightly more eastward, by less than two degrees," Effell stated. "That would be to your left."

"Fine."

"I have gravitized myself to the deck. I would suggest you employ the straps on the seat to ensure your position is maintained. Designate Blane Kajer, I would suggest you also lash yourself down. I find Bolas Scharo’s handling of the vessel to be satisfactory, if in excess speed. There is a risk of being thrown overboard."

Blane didn’t see any security except the seat belts, but wouldn’t be able to maintain their defense with one on because he wouldn’t be able to see as far over the edge of the skipper. He nodded acknowledgment of the Xenthiabot’s concern, but only stooped down a little lower and gripped one of the handlebars with his left hand while holding the Chrid ready with his right.

Other ocean skippers moved out ahead of them. Bolas jabbed his nose in their direction. "Who are they?"

"I am determining that—now!" Effell fired four lasers, two at each opposing ocean skipper, long before Bolas’ more limited human eyesight could distinguish who drove the vessels. Se had compensated for Bolas’ leaping control of the craft, and fired while the ocean skipper was effectively airborne. Suddenly bereft of their drivers, both opposing vessels veered out of control.

"Good shot."

The ocean skipper descended. The Chrid hummed to life almost without Blane’s direction, cutting down two Kropins who had emerged from beneath the surface while the ocean skipper smacked down on it. Within two seconds, the ocean skipper had lurched ahead again. Blane steadied himself.

When they skipped down again, two more Kropins surfaced in near synchronization, but on the other side of the ocean skipper, Blane turned, and the orange fireballs that burst from the Chrid’s cupped end killed both. Effell fired over Bolas’ shoulder, slightly ahead of their progress.

"We must be cautious," Effell warned. "I suspect that the Fejji are coordinating the Kropins and Bekks. Perhaps I should pilot in order to remove the Fejji’s telepathic sense of our location."

"How’ll that help?" Bolas said.

Blane and Effell fired again as the ocean skipper smacked against the water.

"I suspect the Fejji have probed your mind in order to coordinate our progress with Fejji. No organic race can telepathically link to a non-organic Sentient such as myself."

"I’ll solve it!" Blane promised. He moved to get to the front of the vessel, thinking wide rays and fat fireballs into the water ahead of them. The ocean skipper came down. Blane was thrown. He instinctively grabbed at the support bars alone the skipper’s contours, but released the Chrid to reach for that support. The rod hit the side of the ocean skipper then bounced overboard.

Effell fired into the water. One of the Bekks he had targeted screamed a death cry.

Blane cursed. "Shit! The Chrid!"

The ocean skipper had moved forward with another leap out of the water. Bolas whirled towards Blane, who was holding onto the rails against the lurching motions. "Didn’t I tell you to be careful with your toys?!"

Effell fired as they landed. Two more Kropins died, one in mid leap for the ocean skipper.

"Your driving did it! Go back!"

"We’ll never find it!"

"Try!"

They landed. Bolas turned the throttle, spinning the skipper in the water, ruining Effell’s computerized targeting. One of the Kropins had been in mid-leap for the vessel. With Bolas’ unexpected motion, the rear projection of the skipper that helped thrust the vessel along hit the Kropin broadside with a metallic twang and a spray of blood from the Kropin’s mouth.

Effell readjusted hir targeting and shot down the other Kropin. Bolas had slowed speed, looking back and forth.

"Blane, the thing’s metal! It’s gone."

"My sensors have located the Chrid. It is floating on the surface."

"Hah!" Blane shouted, drawing his lasertron.

"You need to adjust forty-seven degrees west. That is to your left."

More Kropins and Bekks surfaced. Two of the Bekks had laser-discharging wristlets and hastily opened fire. The blasts burned into the edge of the skipper to Blane’s left. The metal surface buckled. Jagged edges rose in the lasers’ wake. Blane and Effell both returned fire. Blane missed. Effell didn’t.

Bolas had slowed the vehicle, achieving a smooth coast along the water’s surface. An Oktoid suddenly thrust from the water and landed on the bow. Bolas gasped as the alien reached out with four arms.

Blane spun at the sound of Bolas’ cry, lasertron turning with him. He too gasped. The Oktoid was taller than a human could be, with four fat tentacle arms, two of which had hands. Its eyes were on tentacle stalks, lending even more of an appearance that the alien was just everywhere. Blane fired instinctively, forgetting he had his lasertron and not the Chrid. The laser streaked close to Bolas’ head as it burned into the Oktoid’s skin.

Bolas jumped back, cursing Blane’s near shot that had burned the Oktoid’s skin but not penetrated to strike anything beneath. The seat belt held him in place, easy prey for the Oktoid. Bolas raised his lasertron and jiggled the trigger for a fast series of blasts that burned spots in the Oktoid’s uniform and skin but failed to deter the alien as se reached for Bolas neck. Bolas jerked the support strap open and jolted over the seat with a burst from his pushers.

Blane had seen nothing like an Oktoid before. Maverik might intimidate him, but the sight of the Oktoid triggered a more hopeless fear of being undefeatable. Garrens were just big, and their baseform anatomies gave a more immediate level of comparison. Oktoids were not as big as Garren averages, but they were truly more alien to human eyes, and writhed everywhere. Blane looked to his hand, and saw only the lasertron. With the Chrid, he’d make easy work of the alien, but his lasertron hadn’t even slowed hir.

Effell swivelled and opened fire with a barrage of lasers. Se managed to hit the Oktoid off balance. The alien screeched and splashed back to the water.

Effell trudged forward and took the driver’s seat. "I have the Chrid half in my sensors still. I will move the vessel towards it. I cannot do both and maintain the precision of targeting that you have come to expect."

Blane and Bolas fired at anything that broke the surface and most shadows they saw beneath.

"There it is!" Blane shouted.

"The Chrid half is locked in my sensors. I will pull up alongside it."

Blane realized he would have to reach into the water. He thought of all the teeth he had seen on the Fejji and Kropin.

Effell fired at a Hiat that had launched hirself from the water and on the bow. It splayed its spines and raised its handed fin to aim the wrist laser at Bolas’ face before Effell perforated its enormously puffed chest with a series of lasers. An agonized shriek and an ominous hissing of air preceded the alien’s dead splash back into the water.

Effell slowed the ocean skipper as it neared the Chrid. Blane swallowed hard and holstered his lasertron to free up his hand to grasp for the scepter. Effell’s maneuvering brought the ocean skipper up to the Chrid more precisely than any organic could have managed. Bolas opened fire into the water around the Chrid, hoping to clear the area of any imperials. Blane looked to Bolas for a second, swallowed again, then leaned forward. He jabbed his hand towards the water several times, baiting anything that might come up and bite the appendage clean off. Nothing rose from the depths, but he saw clearly he couldn’t reach it over the side.

Bolas lashed an unfastened seat belt around his leg to support himself then grabbed Blane’s waist. He nudged the younger man forward. "I got you."

"You wanna grab it?"

"You looking for a beating? I told you about throwing your toys away, and I swore I wouldn’t even help you."

Blane mumbled in a bitter, mimicking tone, then kneeled on the edge of the ocean skipper. He examined the lustrous waters and the Chrid on it, bobbing and shining beside the skipper.

Effell marched to the side of the skipper and fired a barrage into the waters. "You got some way to snag it?"

"The expanse is beyond my reach, and I am afraid that the both of you together could not support my weight. I will cover you in order to allow Bolas Scharo to support you with both hands. I clearly recognize the importance in your recovery of this half of the Chrid "

Bolas ensured his grip on the back of Blane’s pants and slapped the younger man. "Now, boy!"

Blane snarled, then leaned over. Bolas stretched himself, holding tight to Blane’s pants with his cybernetic left hand and gripping Blane’s ankle with his right.

Effell spun and fired at two Bekks who broke the surface on the other side of the skipper. The sound and motion startled Blane, who would have fallen if not for Bolas’ firm grip. He came close to panicking and scrambled on the edge of the skipper. Bolas exerted enough pressure to prevent Blane from getting back in the skipper without throwing him overboard.

"Go, Blane!" He landed another resounding slap.

"Your best tactic is to ignore my presence and activities," Effell said. "I work only to our mutual protection."

Blane snarled to himself again and leaned over, relying on Bolas far more than the robot. He realized he trusted Bolas more than he would trust anyone else, except maybe Kass, but at least Kass wouldn’t be spanking him for any delay. He held himself over the water, his fist poised over the Chrid, and he took a deep breath.

He shot his hand forward.

Effell turned.

The Fejji who had been lying in wait surged forward with a single powerful thrust of her broad tail fin. She had maintained a telepathic link to Blane’s mind, telling her exactly when the human would reach into the water.

The Fejji’s maw spread wide. Three rows of teeth led its rise to the surface with telepathic certainty that the human could not pull his hand away in time.

Cued telepathically by the Fejji, three Kropins and two Bekks stormed the opposite side of the ocean skipper, occupying Effell’s attention.

Bolas wrapped his right arm tight around Blane’s thigh as he felt Blane’s pants begin to loosen from the back.

Blane gasped as the Fejji’s mouth appeared as if it had teleported in place around his fist and the Chrid. The mouth snapped shut. Blane gasped and sputtered, but in full stubbornness did not release the Chrid.

Unfortunately for the Fejji, her telepathy could not ascertain the position of the Chrid. The thin, lightweight metal rod acted as a jam, preventing her mouth from closing around the human’s hand. She did the next best thing, letting gravity pull her considerable wight back into the water.

Bolas struggled against the sudden pull. Blane’s pants slipped down, and Bolas scrambled to get both arms around Blane’s waist and legs.

If Blane had thought about it, he would have been surprised that the Chrid could have stayed the force of the Fejji’s jaws. Bolas had held him, but he’d been dunked head first in the middle of a fearful exhalation. He didn’t think at all. He willed the Chrid to release a round energy burst.

The Fejji’s head disintegrated.

With the weight gone, Bolas’ exertion pulled them both back over the edge of the ocean skipper. Blane rolled over Bolas’ face and landed at the finned tail of a Kropin that had hoisted over the opposite edge. Blane couldn’t be sure if his Chrid burst or Effell’s round of fire killed the Kropin. The stump of hir lower body squished against the deck.

Bolas slipped on the wet deck as he unholstered his lasertron.

A barrage of lasers struck from beneath the ocean skipper. No one was at the controls. The imperials had amassed in force beneath the vessel.

Holes burned clean through. Blane and Bolas remained unhurt only for sheer luck. Both jumped and slid as lasers burst from beneath the deck.

One hit Effell, burning up from an angle to strike the inside of hir thigh. Hir leg gave out beneath hir and se crashed to the desk. The ocean skipper bobbed on the water with the sudden crash of weight.

The deck filled with water.

Effell struggled to rise as much as se could. The lucky shot had fused the wiring to hir right leg, rendering the limb unmovable. Still se fired on the Bekks that stormed the bow.

Blane and Bolas had started for the robot. Blane had slipped. Bolas had frozen himself in place when he realized the ocean skipper was sinking and fast.

"Eff, I don’t suppose you can fly."

The robot fired three times. Two Bekks and a Kropin fell. "No unit in the FL series is equipped with thrusters or g-nullifiers." Se fired and killed two more Kropins. "One hundred seventeen. One hundred eighteen," the robot said.

Blane saw three Fejji fins break the surface and circle. He released a volley of small fireballs with the Chrid. The fins disappeared. Bekks and Kropins and Hiats and Oktoids floated when first dead; Fejji sunk like stones.

After hesitating to leave Bolas’ side, Blane waded to the fallen robot. Se fired past Blane. "One hundred nineteen. One hundred twenty."

Bolas moved after Blane, gripping his torso. The water was up to his knees. The ocean skipper was visibly lower on the surface, making boarding by the aquatic aliens even easier. Effell continued firing and counting.

"Blane, we gotta move!"

"What about the Effin robot?"

"Now!" Bolas shouted.

"Do not worry for me. I deactivate to the cause of destroying those who have enslaved my kind and those who created us." Se fired another series of lasers and kept counting. "I have made one hundred thirty-one kills against the imperials since my salvation and liberation. One hundred thirty-two. One hundred thirty-three. One hundred thirty-four."

Bolas turned away from Blane and leaned forward. "On my back, boy."

"May your own Kreators be with you as mine have allied with me," Effell said. "One hundred thirty-five. One hundred thirty-six. One hundred thirt—"

Something massive hit the ocean skipper from beneath the port side. The vessel flipped, throwing all three skyward, then into the water. Effell sunk instantly.

Blane controlled any panic. He hadn’t lost hold of the Chrid. He’d treaded muck pools on Shorns; the light clean water of Simmel’s Gradoal Oshan was a far easier struggle.

Bolas lost his lasertron. Heavier than Blane even if three of his limbs had still been human, he had sunk further. The motion and his belly flop landing disoriented him. He kicked and struggled and saw Fejji and Kropins closing in. He activate his pushers, unwittingly forcing himself deeper.

Blane maintained constant bursts of the Chrid around him, but checked them from burning to far in fears he’d kill Bolas. The water heated around him.

Bolas realized his bubbles were moving almost exactly opposite from his body. Like a true sub-mariner, he twisted and folded himself, changing the direction of his flight through the water. His lungs ached.

A mass of bubbles burst at the surface as the skipper sank.

Blane altered the Chrid’s discharge to maintain a constant shield around the water. To his grateful amazement, he could issue fireballs from the screen itself to kill anything swimming towards him along the surface.

Bolas neared the surface. He could see the glistening sunlight. One Kropin extended its huge jaw to devour Bolas’ legs. Bolas willed himself faster, rocketing into the air. He gasped for breath, coughed, then screamed for Blane.

Blane saw Bolas’ emergence and fired a massive burst along the surface, killing everything in a radius around him.

Bolas saw the blast erupt at the water’s surface. That had made Blane easy enough to find: dead center to the ringed ripples, gripping the incomplete floating carcass of a Kropin to keep himself afloat.

Bolas spun again, swooping down to the surface to divebomb Blane. He arced back skyward with his left arm snagged beneath Blane’s left arm and across his chest to his right shoulder. He coughed again, splattering the back of Blane’s head with swallowed water.

Bolas turned, slowing his flight to spare his energies. Now elevated, he could see the clean Simmellian shoreline. He hoped he had the energy to make it to the coast. He reminded himself that the pushers operated off his own biology and told himself he could run that distance if he had to. He wrapped his other arm around Blane. "Keep an eye out above us. If they’re on to us this much, they’ll send fliers."

"That the right way?" Blane asked.

"Yeah."

"You sure?"

"Yeah.’

"How you sure?"

"Look behind us. You can tell where we came from."

Blane looked past Bolas’ arms and realized the older man was right. A trail of bodies marked their progress across the water from Vedoran’s coast.