Starlight had an excellent navigation system, but huge swaths of Valovian space were uncharted, at least by humans. If we had to run, we had very few escape options, and now that we were close to the planet, Lotkez had broken away from our flight path, so we didn’t have an escort, either.
Not that I would trust Valoffs to help us while we were on the run, but I’d gotten used to seeing Torran’s ship trailing us on my sensors, and the lack felt wrong. My worry rose another notch.
Luna shifted in my lap, nudging me until I resumed petting her. She seemed to sense my anxiety. Or she sensed we were close to a planet. Either way, she had been especially clingy this afternoon, and I appreciated the comfort.
I wasn’t sure what I’d do with her when we landed. Torran didn’t have a private landing pad capable of holding Starlight, so I would have to land in a public spaceport. I hated leaving Luna alone all day, but I wasn’t sure taking her with us was a good idea, not with the way Torran had reacted.
Most spaceports allowed crew to sleep on the ship for as long as it was berthed, so at least we wouldn’t have to pay for a hotel.
And I still hadn’t decided how to return the gifted comm. I needed to talk to Torran, but after our telelock practice yesterday, he’d been surprisingly scarce. He wasn’t avoiding me, exactly, but he seemed to be making an effort to be where I was not.
So maybe he was avoiding me.
Even now, with Valovia glowing green, brown, and white on-screen, he wasn’t in his usual spot at the comm terminal. Instead, Chira had taken his place. The pale Valoff had assured me that Torran was fine when I’d asked.
Eli and Anja were at their terminals, but Kee had holed up in her control room with Lexi, searching for info on the heist, the guards, and anything else she could find. Now that we were close to Valovia, Kee had real-time access to the Valovian networks and the knowledge needed to use them, so she was taking full advantage.
The minutes crept by. Starlight reported our destination to ground control and got nearly instantaneous approval to land. My anxiety crawled higher. In space we’d be hard pressed to escape, but once we were on the ground it became infinitely harder, and Valovia seemed awfully eager to accept us.
Torran finally entered the bridge when we were just five minutes from atmospheric entry. He met my stare with a level gaze, his expression smoothed into flat nothingness.
“Remember that you promised us safe passage on your honor,” I said. My voice came out steady despite the nerves squeezing my chest.
I caught a tiny flicker, as if he wanted to break my gaze but overcame the urge. “I remember.”
Personal honor was a cornerstone of Valovian society. Would Torran destroy his to capture a human crew? I wanted to believe the answer was no, but I wasn’t exactly impartial. I liked Torran and his crew. Over the past week, I’d stopped seeing them as enemies.
But I also needed to be careful. I had no doubt that we would receive a very cold reception on Valovia, even if we weren’t immediately murdered or imprisoned. We needed to do the job we were hired for, get paid, and then beat a hasty retreat back into safer space.
The one-minute warning sounded and everyone strapped in. Sixty seconds later, Starlight’s Shadow sank into the Valovian atmosphere with a judder. The ship definitely was not at its best in atmosphere. It lumbered like a beast too heavy for flight.
I made some minor adjustments to the autopilot but mostly let the ship take us in. Below, the view turned green. Torran lived in Zenzi, the capital city, nestled within the planet’s temperate equatorial girdle.
As we drew closer, a sprawling city came into view. The orange sun was either rising or setting, causing the taller buildings to glow on one side and cast deep shadows on the other. A check of the local time confirmed that it was early morning.
Getting used to a solar day that was ten hours long was going to be a struggle. It was only in the last hundred years or so that Valoffs had combined two solar days into one longer unit, buratbos, a shortening of “two sun day.”
Before the widespread adoption of artificial lighting, Valoffs worked and slept in short bursts with the natural daylight. With the adoption of the longer twenty-hour buratbos, they worked through a day, a night, and most of another day before sleeping through the second night. It roughly translated to fourteen or fifteen awake hours and five to six sleeping hours.
I wasn’t sure I would adjust, even if we were here for the full length of the contract. At least my quarters didn’t have any outside windows, so I could sleep without the sun shining in my eyes.
The spaceport was at the edge of the city, a huge flat area dotted with other ships. Ground control guided us in, and Starlight settled on the landing pad with a final jolt.
Someone let out a quiet sigh, but otherwise, the bridge remained eerily quiet. Eli and Anja studied their screens. The Valoffs stayed in their seats. I checked the outside cameras. A few people were visible at distant ships, but no one was waiting to snatch us up.
Yet.
I shut down the engines and prepared to put the ship in standby. We were on Valovia. It still didn’t feel real, despite the images streaming in from the outside cameras.
Luna stood and stretched. She sent me a wave of longing with a mental picture of her empty food bowl. It wasn’t dinnertime yet, but we’d skipped lunch, so she was hungry.
I scooped her up and rose. The rest of the shutdown checklist could wait a few minutes. And if anyone was waiting for us outside, maybe they would get impatient and tip their hand.
Eli glanced up. “Going to feed the little beastie?” Fond affection took the sting out of the words.
“Yes. She missed lunch and she wants me to know about it. I’ll finish the checklist when I get back. Keep an eye on things.”
He nodded and went back to his screen.
I carried Luna to the galley, where she promptly sent me another wave of longing. I set her next to her bowl and scratched behind her ears. “I’m working on it, Little Miss Impatient. Give me more than a nanosecond, yeah?”
Patience had never been Luna’s strong suit. She twined around my legs and nipped at me when I didn’t move fast enough for her. I held the food out of reach with a stern look until she settled, then I put it in her bowl. She sent me a wave of affection before she started eating.
My heart swelled with return affection. I loved the fluffy little menace, impatience and all.
Torran entered the galley on silent feet. When he saw he had my attention, he asked, “Will you be ready to depart once she is finished eating?”
“I’ll be ready once I put Starlight in standby.”
Torran’s gaze flashed to my face. “You aren’t bringing her with you?”
“She’ll be safer here. And she can look after herself until we get back later.”
Torran frowned. “You’re planning to return to the ship tonight?”
“Yes. There’s no reason to pay for a hotel when we have perfectly good rooms here.”