Rose had something she did, putting her fists on either side of her head and opening them and softly saying, 'boom'. Like an explosion.
She said it meant 'mind blown'.
He'd never understood it.
Now he had an inkling.
This was all so . . . interesting.
He liked it.
He also had to get going now--put his plan into action. The Tecran solar system was coming up and he needed to disappear. Needed to uphold the agreement he'd made, although the Tecran thought he'd be out of sight because he'd be sitting at the edge of their system, not out of sight because he'd be shielding himself as he sat on Gyre, the bigger of Tecra's two moons.
He'd be minutes away from the planet there, instead of hours.
“I'll be in touch if something comes up,” he said to Dray, watching through the visual comms as the officer went still, holding up the heavy weights he was lifting in the battleship's gym with a grimace. “I'm off to hide now.”
Dray set the weights down carefully and wiped his forehead. “You sure you can be that close and stay hidden?”
“Very sure.” Bane thought of all the times he'd come and gone from Tecra when he'd been under the control of the Tecran military, and if he'd had a mouth, it would have been turned up in a wry twist.
“You've done it before.” Dray's eyes went up to the lens in the gym. His expression was one of sudden understanding. “You're an old hand at it.”
“Let's put it this way,” Bane allowed amusement to color his tone, “it's not my first time.”
“The military knows you can do that.” Dray spoke softly. “If they've done it when you were under their control, they probably won't believe you're sitting at the edge of the system.”
“Yes.” He'd already thought of that. “But if they come looking for me on Gyre, that'll leave a trace in the system. You'll need to look out for it.”
Dray nodded slowly. “And if they find you?”
“Dead Tecran tell no tales.” Bane kept his voice even.
Dray said nothing, his lips a tight line. And then he nodded. “Agreed.”
He'd chosen his ally well, Bane thought, and something that felt like warmth flooded him.
If he did find the Earth woman, he would at least have someone he was beginning to trust as his feet on the ground.
His sidekick, as Rose called herself in relation to Sazo.
He smiled at the thought of Rose. She'd sent him a message this morning, telling him she was thinking of him, and hoped the trip wasn't too hard on him. Too traumatic.
It made him wonder about the anger and tension he'd felt when he'd come into contact with the Tecran envoy. Was that part of the trauma?
He had no one to ask. And he didn't mind the anger. He . . . relished it.
He hadn't been able to express it until Rose had freed him, and for a while after she had, he'd wallowed in it.
Now it was more focused. And he controlled it, not the other way around.
Mostly.
Because he enjoyed doing it, and because Rose told him it had a lot of visual impact, he started to spin his Class 5 in place. It didn't do anything, didn't have any significance, except that he was having fun, but Rose was right in that it seemed to take up a lot of discussion time among the allies that were part of the United Council.
Then he shot up and kept going.
The moment he was out of range, he changed course, shielding himself as he sped toward Tecra, and when he was more or less directly above the moon, he slowly sank downward.
He would land on Gyre a few hours before the Tecran envoy and the Urna got here.
His shields were one way. He could pick up signals while his own remained untraceable.
As he dropped lazily through space, he began listening for any comms coming from Tecra.
If an incident was local, most likely he'd only pick it up when he got to Gyre, but he scanned anyway.
If the Earth woman was still alive and on Tecra, the arrival of the UC would hopefully spark some reaction.
If it did, he didn't intend to miss it.
“That was quite a show Bane put on.” Zutobi leaned back in her chair as Dray joined her and Yolandi at the dining table.
They tended to eat together at dinner every night, talking over things that they thought were important to the mission, but having lunch together was unusual. It was probably one of the last lunches they'd have onboard, though.
“Was it?” Dray slid into his seat and set his plate down. “I was in the gym. I didn't see it.”
“Oh.” Yolandi looked up in surprise. “You missed something good. It was a show, as Zutobi says.”
“An unnecessary one, in my view. All he needed to do was stop and let us pass him, surely?” Zutobi's glance across at him was amused.
Dray let his lips quirk. “But then no one would be talking about it as much.”
“No.” Zutobi grinned. “He's certainly adept at playing to the crowd.”
“Given what the crowd thought of him and his kind until recently, you can hardly blame him.” Yolandi set down her cutlery. “I'm guessing the ambassador is probably pleased with what he did. Maybe she even discussed it with him.”
“Maybe.” Dray didn't think he'd be so lucky, but he was happy to agree. He hoped Yolandi shared her theory with more than just him and Zutobi.
“Speaking of whom . . .” Zutobi murmured.
Dray turned and saw the ambassador heading for their table, a plate in her hand.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Of course not.” Yolandi pulled back the chair next to her. “Please do.”
Filavantri Dimitara sat daintily down and held Dray's gaze. “Did you see Bane leave?”
He shook his head. “I was in the gym. I heard it was a sight to see.”
She inclined her head. “He has completely disappeared from our scanners. The Tecrans, as well.”
“So they're happy now?” Yolandi asked.
“We've given them what they asked for, so I assume so.” Dimitara shrugged. “I didn't exactly get a thank you, though.”
“How long until we reach Tecra?” Zutobi set her empty plate aside.
“We'll be there in two hours.” Dimitara looked less than enthusiastic. “Already I've seen footage from Tecra that shows how deeply they resent our coming.”
Dray lifted his shoulders. “If it was my planet, I'd be resentful, too, but they can't pretend they didn't bring it on themselves.”
“I think the line is that they didn't know what the military were doing, so they shouldn't be punished.” Dimitara started eating the meat on her plate, and Dray caught a flash of those sharp, sharp teeth again.
“We expected that.” Yolandi sighed. “They don't want to accept responsibility, but the people of Tecra run the government, and the military is part of that. They can't use the excuse that they didn't know. They should have known. They weren't vigilant enough.”
Dray thought of all the checks and balances in place in the Grihan military, and had to agree.
If they hadn't known--and some of them must have done--they should have. They needed to accept their punishment and cooperate.