Kylee didn’t give him a chance to reply; she flexed her left arm. Lifted the screaming Soukup off the deck and started climbing. Sure, she had quetzal strength, but it took all of it to muscle Soukup’s half-limp weight to the top. The whole way, he kept shrieking “Stop! No! Please!”

“If it’s the pinch from your britches that’s got you in a knot, your balls will heal.” She’d just made the top of the hatch, muscles trembling, felt her grip giving on the man’s pants. Damn it! That fancy fucking fabric. He was going to slip through her fingers. The tumble back down onto the deck . . .

Just as the last of the slippery fabric slithered through her fingers, Soukup rose as if on wings. Kylee twisted her head around to see Flute’s big head blocking Capella’s light. Soukup’s collar was stretched, dangling from Flute’s serrated jaws.

After the quetzal laid the squealing IG down next to the still-gaping Bogarten, all Soukup could do was whimper, his face a mask of terror and agony.

“Well,” Kylee muttered. “At least we got them out of the shuttle.”

Then she glanced up at the sky. Capella was starting its slant to the west, burning hot, white, and unforgiving. But that was the only thing in the sky. Where the hell was Kalico’s shuttle?

With both rifles slung, Falise climbed up and out, catching Kylee’s expression. “What’s the matter?”

“I don’t know.” Kylee pointed skyward. “Kalico should be here by now. Something’s wrong.”

Chapter 58

  58  

There were four of them: Talina, Dek, Briah Muldare, and the soft meat marine, Private Sunny Valdez. They assembled at the edge of the Southern Diggings pad, standing on the berm where it overlooked the forest below. The difference, this time was that Briah and Sunny both carried what the marines called “boom tubes”—though the official designation was Distance Ranging Remote Detonation Devices, or DRRDDs—along with their rifles.

For the first time in years, Muldare was in shining new armor, fully functional with a brand-new powerpack instead of her old suit with its make-do repairs. The look on the woman’s face as she clamped her new helmet in place was satisfied. She turned to Tal, saying, “All right, now let’s go kick ass” and propped the boom tube over her shoulder next to her slung rifle.