That was reason number two why she hadn’t responded when Loqi said it. Reason number one was a bit more macabre.
“Stuff like that’ll jinx you,” Aranea continued. “It’s the kind of thing people say before they up and die.”
Considering the situation they’d left Loqi in, letting his message go unanswered and presumably unheard seemed the optimistic response.
Wedge started to say something else, but she cut him off, eager to leave the topic behind. “Wedge, how many times have I told you to cut it out with the garlic already? Could you please not eat that stuff when you’re aboard the ship?! It reeks in here! And not just of garlic! You smell like a half-empty beer bottle that’s been sitting out all day!”
Normally, and in no small contrast to Biggs, Wedge was a man of few words. He was cautious and apprehensive by nature, but there were two things that could flip his switch: a situation that was looking dire, or a couple of drinks down his throat. Either would loosen his tongue and embolden his actions, the former in particular being exasperating―once he was going, he wouldn’t shut up.
During their escape from Gralea, when Wedge had found himself stuck between a rock and a hard pack of daemons, he’d probably thrown back a few spirits to lift his own. You know, the normal thing to do when being chased by enemies, weaving through a dense cityscape at high airspeeds. And of course, no drink was complete for Wedge without his favorite snack: pickled garlic.
But her lecture didn’t have much effect.
“Wooo! Feelin’ pretty good right now!” he exclaimed.
“Oh for gods’ sake.”
“Yeehaw!”
“Wedge, shut up. I’m serious.”
Aranea looked over at their young passenger. The girl sat rigidly in her seat, her mouth firmly shut. It might have been unease or lingering shock or maybe just an attempt not to breathe in the stink of garlic and booze. With her mouth shut tight, at least there wasn’t any worry about her biting her tongue with a sudden movement of the ship.
With her hard, blank expression, and wrapped up in Loqi’s mantle, she didn’t appear to be a typical cosseted little noble girl. Still, she was used to being picked up and held. Aranea had felt it when she had taken the girl in her arms. Whoever raised her had clearly doted on her.
And what was it Loqi had said? Direct orders of His Radiance. What was that supposed to imply? Just as the threads were beginning to draw together in her mind, Wedge interrupted her thoughts.
“We got ’em now! Tiny and the airship, dead ahead!”
He glanced over his shoulder at their passenger. “Hang on tight, little lady!”
Wedge slammed on the throttle. The force of the acceleration pressed them all back into their seats. As the speck of the dreadnought quickly grew larger on the display, Wedge started rambling. “The core on its head. That’s what makes it go. Which means all we gotta do is punch a hole in the core. The whole thing’ll go down. But there’s a problem. Up here it’ll be like throwing pins at a thumbtack. So we’ll have to knock the dreadnought outta the sky. Could pin ’im down for us. Keep things nice and local. And if we’re real lucky, we might get the whole ship to blow up in Tiny’s face. Wouldn’t that be a real show?”
He didn’t seem to notice whether Aranea was following or not.
“Wedge!” she yelled. “Focus! What’s the plan?”
He sniffed. “We take down the ship.”
“Got it.”
It was all she needed to hear. She got on the autocannon control and started shooting, finger hard on the trigger. But the dropship’s firepower was no match for the dreadnought’s armor―Aranea could have fired the cannon for days and left not a scratch on the other ship’s thick hull.
Wedge pushed the dropship into a nosedive, and then, with their stomachs still in their throats, burned into a steep ascent. It looked like he’d reached the same conclusion.
“Lady A! Target the ship’s engines!”
“I’m on it!”
The second the dropship’s nose came up far enough for a target lock, she had the cannon on full blast. No need to worry about retaliatory fire for the moment. She could leave that up to Wedge. He’d be able to evade it well enough. Her job was to rip the dreadnought a new asshole.
“Straight down the tailpipe!”
“That’s what I’m doing!”
They were in a race against time to stop the thing before it reached Tenebrae, and now, more crucially, before they ran out of fuel and ammo.
Crash, damn it! Crash! she screamed internally as she continued firing.
“Crash!”
Or rather, she’d meant it to be internal.
“Crash!” Wedge joined in.
“Crash!” Now all three of them were chanting it.
“Bad news, Lady A! We’re almost out of fuel!”
She heard the panic in his voice. The ship jerked violently.
“Crash, already!”
“We’re going down!”
They were slowly losing altitude, and now she was out of rounds. But luck hadn’t forsaken them quite yet. Not entirely, anyway.
The dreadnought’s cannons fell silent. The incoming fire ceased. And then the mammoth ship was listing. Metal screamed and flames burst from the superstructure as the craft began its downward spiral, Diamond Weapon still dangling in its harness below. The lush forests of Tenebrae lay ahead of them.
They watched as Diamond Weapon slammed into the ground. Dust geysered into the air and hung suspended, blocking their view. It was impossible to see what had become of the airship―or of the monster.
“Did we get ’im?”
Wind gently tugged at the veil of dust, and the dreadnought was slowly revealed. It lay on its side, half-demolished.
In its shadow, something moved.
They heard a piercing roar as Diamond Weapon rose from the wreckage.
“Oh for the love of . . . ”
Aranea slammed a fist against the gun controls. They had no ammunition left, and at this point they were running on fumes. Wedge was managing to keep the ship on a stable, if low, flight path, but there was no way he could coax from it the kind of mobility they’d need to fight a daemon-infused superweapon.
“Wedge. I want you to head for Tenebrae. Stop Biggs’s train. There’s enough fuel left for that, right?”
The fight against Diamond Weapon wasn’t over yet. She still had one card left to play.
“Get the civilians out of the area. Evacuate whomever you can.”
She stood.