Chapter 13

Relda leaned into the controls, gripping them with all her might. In her passenger cabin, Annika, Ozla, Klea, and Tayla peered through the front window as they whizzed through the night sky. Ahead of their transport, Raylay flew with Daly, Darrion, Anthem, and Anniston. Behind Relda and her crew, Ty transported Asia, Noah, Shilah, and Bria.

Relda gritted her teeth. The shade of her knuckles changed from navy blue to cerulean.

"What's the matter, Mama?" Annika asked.

"I, uh," Relda sputtered. "Haven't piloted a transport in probably twenty-five years."

She glanced into her rear view screen. The girls squirmed.

"Good...to know," Ozla said around erratic breathing.

Klea pointed through the front window.

"There it is," she announced.

The steel sphere nearly blended with the rock cliff that towered above it. Two flaps on the side--like the doors used for domestics mammalians--mirrored each other.

On ahead, Raylay's ship lowered between the rock formation and the sphere. The ceiling of his ship disappeared, and he and the crew kept a low profile as they progressed toward the battle station. A doorway unsealed, and one at a time, they filed into it.

"We're going in for a landing," she told her daughters.

She grabbed hold of a lever, and the ground ahead of them grew.

"Be quiet," she said.

"Mama," Klea said in a soft, childlike tone. "Our blasters are still in Uncle Raylay's transport."

"So is the rest of our stuff," Ozla added.

A quick look down at her hospital patient garment was a solemn reminder that this was true.

"We'll get them," Relda said. "If we don't, we'll take them from the Dialorians."

She patted the control board, and said, "Keep quiet. Don't let the enemy see you. Go where Uncle Raylay and the oldest girls went."

A few moments later, they reunited with Raylay and his crew in a walkway.

"This way," he told them, gesturing to indicate a colossal chamber down the walkway. The entire chamber was a gunmetal gray.

A series of viewing screens occupied a desk. Raylay tapped a viewing screen, and the gunmetal wall opened to a glass observation window.

"Look at this, Mama," Darrion said, taking her place at another screen.

Relda watched. A spy camera enabled viewing of the outside. The twin flaps opened, and blasters emerged. The length, she estimated, was about the same as the average transport.

"Cannons," Darrion said. "Laser cannons."

Relda went slack jawed and eyed Raylay. A collective gasp rose from clones. The Dialorian ship was too close.

"Prepare to shoot," Raylay said, "and be prepared. Dialorian tech can be difficult to penetrate."

A beam descended from the bottom of the ship, and images flashed through Relda's mind. When the Dialorian ship beamed up the medallion.

It teleported something else, but it was clearly not a medallion. This time, it was worse. This time, a life-form entered the transport beam and made a rapid ascent into the ship's belly.

"Hold fire," Relda instructed.

She gazed into the ship's underside.

"That could have been Hunley they just took."

"Run an analysis on the footage," Raylay told the girls.

Footsteps marched against the metal flooring.

"They took the baby Curian," Shilah announced.