being traded back to Father like chattel. At worst . . . well, there were things worse than death.
Rhys stared me down but I didn’t flinch. “Okay,” he said at last, “then let’s discuss the plan. Why do you want to land? You could jump from the upper atmosphere and parachute in. If we keep the ship stealthed, you might escape detection until you breached the facility.”
I shuddered. I wasn’t afraid of heights. I’d been known to perform dangerous stunts at height just for the thrill. But I’d never enjoyed skydiving. “If I jump out of this ship, it’s only because it’s on fire. And having the ship on the ground gives me a solid retreat option if I run into more trouble than I can handle,” I said.
“If this is a trap, it also gives Rockhurst a solid target,” Loch said. “We’ll be sitting ducks.”
“You think he’ll blow up a prototype ship when he has a chance to recover it?” I asked.
“If he’s sure you’re not on board? Yeah, I think he’ll blow us up and not bat an eye,” he said. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was arguing just for the sake of arguing.
“Fine,” I said, addressing both men. “You can drop me off and return to orbit. We’ll still be able to communicate and you can jump at the first sign of danger. In fact, if I find that this is the planet where they’re mining alcubium, you can go ahead and jump to the gate. I’ll find my own way back. I’ll write down my demands from Father before I go—I’d appreciate it if you included them in the negotiations.”
If anything, Loch looked less pleased by that option. I threw up my hands. “I’m done arguing. You will drop me off and return to orbit. If it’s a trap, jump out at the first opportunity. If it’s not, you can pick me up when I’m done poking around.”
Neither Loch nor Rhys looked happy, but both nodded begrudgingly. I changed the flight plan to land us at the spaceport. The ship estimated arrival in twenty minutes.
“Polaris, make Rhys Sebastian and Marcus Loch temporary first officers,” I said. The ship prompted them to confirm their identities and voice imprints. As temporary first officers, they would be able to pilot the ship but not add or remove crew—notably me. So they couldn’t remove me from the captain’s position and take us into safer space.
They also wouldn’t be able to assign anyone else as captain, so Father would still need me in order to completely secure control over the ship. I hadn’t sent my sister the ship’s override codes and they were not codes I had used before. So if I died, Father would have to spend a great deal of time and effort cracking the codes by brute force. I decided it was an acceptable risk.
“Time to gear up,” I said. “Rhys, let’s see if that giant pile of stuff you brought is actually useful.”
“I have the codebreaker you need,” he said, “plus a few extra items that will come in handy.”
I led the way down to the cargo bay. The flight got a little rougher as the ship entered the atmosphere, but the compensators on this ship were much better than those in the escape shuttle we’d landed on TSD Nine.
Rhys sorted through his gear while Loch leaned against the wall with crossed arms and a distant expression. His posture screamed disinterest, but his eyes were sharp. I could almost see the wheels turning in his head.
While Rhys dug, I typed out my ideal concessions from Father on my spare com. I doubted Rhys would be able to get them all, but even one or two would make my life easier. I sent the list to Rhys, hesitated, then sent it to Loch as well. There wasn’t anything too surprising on the list and having a backup wasn’t a bad idea.
At five minutes to touchdown, Rhys called me over. He handed me a backpack and started loading it and my cargo pockets with the gear he thought I’d need—a backup com, grenades, ammo, a stunstick, breaching charges, door stops, and small charges with remote detonators. Smaller items went in my pockets while the larger things like the breaching charges had to be in the backpack.
On the belt around my waist he clipped the codebreaker that would hopefully get me through the doors without need for the explosives. A pistol blaster went on my right hip