The Deacon was shivering now, his whole blue-gray body quaking with terror. The Shipmistress knew the Unggoy was right: what she planned to do was heresy. Only the Prophets were allowed access to relics. And if tampering with a Luminary meant death, defying the Prophets meant damnation.
Then suddenly the Deacon calmed. Eyes darting between the glyphs in the holo-tank and the bright red tip of Zhar's laser cutter, his breathing slowed. Chur'R-Yar knew the Unggoy was smarter than most and guessed he had just realized the full extent his predicament: the Shipmistress had told him her secret plans, and yet he lived. Which could only mean one thing: She had a plan for him.
"What would my Shipmistress have me do?" Dadab asked. Chur'R-Yar's teeth glittered in the Luminary's weakened light. "I need you to lie."
The Deacon nodded. And the Shipmistress set course for the relic-laden ship.
Henry "Hank" Gibson loved his freighter—loved her big, ugly lines and the quiet rumble of her Shaw-Fujikawa drive. Most of all he loved to sail her, which most people thought was a little unusual when a NAV computer could do just as well. But that was fine by Hank because, even more than his ship, he loved not giving a damn what people thought of him, something to which either of his ex-wives would gladly attest.
Human ship captains weren't uncommon in the UNSC commercial fleet; they just mainly sailed cruise ships and other passenger vessels. Hank had worked for one of the big cruise companies—served on the luxury liner Two Drink Minimum nonstop from Earth to Arcadia for the better part of fifteen years, the last five as first mate.
But the liner had needed all kinds of computer assistance to get from A to B while keeping its hundreds of passengers well fed and rested. Hank was a self-avowed loner, and it didn't matter if the voices talking to him were human or simulated—he liked a quiet bridge. And Two Drink Minimum's certainly wasn't that. If the pay hadn't been so good, and the time away from his wives so therapeutic, Hank would have quit a whole lot sooner.
Other than astrogation (the coordination of Slipspace jumps that required a NAV computer), a freighter captain could handle as many of his ship's normal space operations as he liked. Hank loved having his hands on the controls—blasting away with his hydrazine rockets as he bullied thousands of tons of cargo in and out of a planet's gravity well. The fact that he owned his ship, This End Up, made sailing her even sweeter. It had taken all his savings, painful renegotiations of his alimonies, and a loan so large he didn't like to think about it, but now he was his own boss. He got to pick what he hauled and over time he built up a list of customers who were willing to pay a little extra for personalized service.
One of his most reliable customers was JOTUN Heavy Industries, a Mars-based firm specializing in the construction of semi-autonomous farm machinery. His freighter's hold was currently filled with a prototype of their next series of plows—massive machines designed to till wide swaths of earth. The things were incredibly expensive, and Hank assumed a prototype would be even more so. Which was why, staring at a console filled with flashing warning lights, he was more angry than afraid.
This End Up's unknown attacker had hit while the ship was hurtling toward Harvest on a high-speed intercept vector. Hank survived the attack unharmed. But the hostile fire had ruined his Shaw-Fujikawa drive, fried his maneuvering rockets and maser—caused more damage to This End Up than he could afford to repair. Piracy was unheard of on the routes Hank ran, and he had never even considered adding the optional, extremely expensive coverage to his policy.
Hank slapped his hand on the console, silencing a new alarm: hull breach, port side of the cargo container, close to the stern. He could feel the rubberized floor of the command cabin vibrate as something worked its way through the hull.
"God damn it!" Hank cursed, wrenching a fire extinguisher from a wall bracket. He hoped the pirates wouldn't damage the JOTUN prototype as they cut their way inside.
"Fine. These jerks wanna break my ship?" Hank snarled, hefting the extinguisher above his head. "Then they're gonna buy it."
The interior of Minor Transgression's umbilical glowed red as its penetrator tip burned into the alien vessel. Through the semi-transparant walls, Dadab could see laser scarring on the vessel's propulsion unit—black slash-marks from Chur'R-Yar's comprehensive crippling.
How can she be so calm?! Dadab groaned, looking down the umbilical at the Shipmistress.
She stood behind Zhar, one clawed hand resting on the grip of her holstered plasma-pistol— like a Kig-Yar pirate queen of old—poised for boarding action. The other two Kig-Yar crewmen standing just behind her were less composed. Both of them fiddled with their energy cutlasses: pink crystal shards used as melee weapons. Dadab wondered if the crewmen, like him, realized they were doomed.
He imagined Chur'R-Yar would succeed in removing the relic (though some had proven to be quite dangerous, even in the Prophets' deft hands). Then she would probably jump right into the thick of Covenant space—where her relic would show as one of countless others—and quickly find a buyer before raising any Ministry suspicions. It was a plausible plan. But Dadab knew he and any other unnecessary witnesses would be dead long before it was completed. In his case, immediately after he transmitted a false accounting of the number of Luminations in the alien system.
The umbilical dimmed as its penetrator tip finished its burn through the hull. The end of the passage irised open to reveal a shimmering energy field.
"Have the Huragok check the pressure," Chur'R-Yar said, glancing back at Dadab.
The Deacon turned and signed to Lighter Than Some behind him: < Check, air, equal. > Before they boarded the alien vessel, they needed to be sure there was a balance between the umblilical's atmosphere and that of the ship's hold. If there wasn't, they might be torn apart as they passed through the field.
The Huragok floated nonchalantly past Dadab. For Lighter Than Some, this was just another opportunity to be helpful. It checked the sensors governing the field and loosed a satisfied bleat. Zhar wasted no time jumping through.
"It is safe!" the Kig-Yar male announced via his signal unit. Chur'R-Yar motioned the other male crewmen forward, then slipped through the field followed closely by Lighter Than Some.
Dadab took a deep breath and offered a silent prayer for the Prophets' forgiveness. Then he too passed into the alien vessel.
Its hold wasn't nearly as packed as the first one they'd encountered. Instead of floor-to- ceiling containers of fruit, the space was dominated by a single piece of cargo: a towering machine with six massive wheels. On the front of the machine was a beam—wider than the machine itself—fitted with toothlike spikes, each twice as tall as Dadab. Most of the machine's internal parts were shrouded by yellow and blue painted metal, but here and there Dadab saw exposed circuits and pneumatics. Above the toothed beam were a series of raised, bright metal symbols: J-O-T-U-N.
Dadab cocked his head. If the symbols were Forerunner, he hadn't ever seen them. But he wasn't too surprised; he was just a lowly Deacon, and there were countless holy mysteries he had yet to understand.
"Tell the Huragok to investigate," Chur'R-Yar snapped, pointing at the machine.
Dadab clapped his paws together to get Lighter Than Some's attention: < Find, relic! > The Huragok ballooned the largest of its sacs, increasing its buoyancy. As it rose above one of the machine's large wheels, it vented a smaller chamber, propelling itself through a curtain of multicolored wires.