Riyannah was floating around the cabin, still wearing only the G-string and sandals. Her eyes half-shut and dull, but she pulled herself briskly down to look at Blade. When she'd satisfied herself he was all right, she drifted over to one of the panels and began pushing buttons.
«I've got to drop the power plant,» she said. «The Targans hit it too often, and it will become unstable in a few more minutes.»
Blade found he could speak. «What are we going to use for power?»
«We're already on a course that will take us within radio range of the asteroid belt. The patrol ship will come out to get us when they pick up our radio signals.»
«What about the Targan ships?»
«We're traveling too fast for anything except Dark Warrior herself to catch us. Even if they could come after us, they'll think we blew up when the power plant explodes.» She punched a complicated sequence of buttons. Something clicked under the floor and something else rang like a great bell in the tail of the ship. The jolt threw Blade against his straps.
Now Riyannah pulled something pistol-shaped out of a drawer under one console and began running it through her hair. As she did she revolved gently in midair. Blade saw that in spite of her cheerful, brisk manner, the last few days had left their marks on her. The red-brown skin was dark with bruises in half a dozen places and seemed stretched even more tightly than before over her delicate bones. She must be running on nerves and drugs, and perhaps also on the happiness of being back in a familiar place, safely on the way home.
Riyannah had just finished cleaning her hair when a soundless explosion of raw light burst on the screen, flooding the cabin. Half-dazzled, Blade reached out for Riyannah's hand and felt her fingers close on his wrist. Lying side by side, Riyannah in midair and Blade still strapped in his seat, they watched the screen.
Far behind them an expanding globe of purple fire hung in space fading slowly. Sparks of red and gold trailed out of it to drift off into the blackness. It was something as violent as an atomic explosion but definitely not the same. That purple glow was fading too slowly. Some sort of energy-generating reaction was still going on back there, minutes after the explosion. Blade watched the purple glow shrink and fade, still throwing out sparks. Then he could see the planet they were leaving behind; and he instantly lost interest in the explosion.
Targa was-Earth. There was a little more dust in the atmosphere, so the clouds were more gray than white and the outlines of the continents weren't always clear. That was a minor detail. Everything else Blade could see, down to the smallest cape and bay, was what he'd seen in photographs of Earth taken from space.
It was a big universe, and no doubt it was possible that somewhere a planet existed which could look this much like Earth. Such a planet was only a theory, though, and Dimension X was a fact. Blade knew he'd been shifted sideways through the Dimension, not across light-years of space to another world in the same Dimension. That was the only reasonable explanation now. Targa and Kanan and the Menel were fighting their interstellar war across the light-years in Dimension X.
That thought was awesome, but it was also something of a relief. It was awesome, because it implied that each Dimension was a whole universe, not just a whole Earth. It implied an infinity of infinities, an idea even Lord Leighton might have some difficulty grasping.
It was also a relief to know that he was in Dimension X. He'd made it home from some weird places before, and it would be an unpleasant surprise if he couldn't make it home from Targa. Not from Kanan-he still wasn't sure the computer could reach across both Dimensions and light-years-but if he could somehow get back to Targa he should be all right.
Meanwhile he could help Kanan or refuse to help them without worrying about what they might do to Earth. Unless they got the whole Dimension X secret as well as their interstellar drive, Home Dimension Earth was as far beyond their reach as anything could be. He'd still have to guard the Dimension X secret, but that was a simpler proposition than what he'd been facing before.
Blade looked at the screen again. Before Riyannah dumped the power plant, it must have given the ship a terrific velocity. Targa was distinctly smaller than when he'd first seen it. The outlines of the continents were beginning to blur and the planet was turning into a cloud-flecked blue ball.
Riyannah was now strapped into her seat again, and from the regular rise and fall of her breasts Blade realized she was asleep. In sleep her face relaxed, all the strain and tension gone along with the warrior-goddess look.
She'd said the Kananites were peaceful, with no wars for a thousand years. Perhaps she was shading the truth. Or perhaps Riyannah was not quite typical of her people. Certainly there was a warrior in Riyannah, and not far below the surface either. She had courage, common sense, the ability to enjoy a good fight, and the ability to pick up technical details quickly.
That was enough to make a warrior and even a war leader. More than enough, considering how senseless and slow to learn some of history's «great captains» had been. If there were more Kananites like Riyannah, the Targans might not have an easy victory, or indeed any victory at all.
Blade yawned, tightened the straps to keep from floating around the cabin, and drifted off to sleep himself.
Chapter 12
Blade awoke to find Riyannah floating in the air in front of him. She was holding onto the arm of his seat with one hand and rubbing his thigh with a soft cloth held in the other. He saw that he was now naked, while Riyannah was wearing a loose coverall with a closing strip from throat to groin.
«Lie still a little more, Richard. You shouldn't have gone to sleep without looking at that wound. I had to do more to get out the infection than I should have. I'm not a doctor, you know.»
He patted her free hand. «I know. But I seem to remember a certain lady who also fell asleep as if she'd been hit on the head.»
Riyannah pulled a small black tube from a pouch at her belt and sprayed something cool and scented on Blade's thigh. Then she let go of the seat and sat cross-legged in midair in front of him.
«I did sleep. The drugs I used to fight the cold and get ready to fly the ship wouldn't last forever. If I tried to go on, I'd be sick, starting with my stomach. Have you ever taken a long trip in a spaceship with no gravity after someone has been sick to their stomach?»
Blade considered the idea and nodded. «I see what you mean.» He sat up and reached out to pull Riyannah toward him, but she kicked herself just out of reach. «No, Richard. Right now I think we eat.»
Blade realized that his stomach was too empty even to rumble and nodded again. «Yes. I'm going to enjoy something beside Targan emergency rations and half-raw meat for a change.»
Riyannah set an alarm so they'd be warned if the radar set picked up any other ships. «I think we're too far out for the Targans and too close to Targa for any of our own. But you never know.»
«What will we do without the power plant if a Targan ship does find us?»
«We should be moving too fast for it to even hit us. We can also shoot back a few times with the hurd-ray, using the emergency power cells. After that-«She shrugged, a motion which made her body twist sensuously in the zero gravity.
The meal was dried and frozen foods mixed with hot water or thawed in a small infrared oven. There was a meat that tasted like a cross between turkey and ham, something like mashed potatoes with a delicious nutty flavor, and three kinds of vegetables which looked and tasted like nothing Blade had ever imagined. Dessert was a crunchy blue-fleshed fruit, soaked in something like highly spiced honey. Riyannah prepared enough food for six people but there were no leftovers.