I expected them to rush us. Instead there was nothing. No movement, no light. Some muted clangs traveled through the steel floor. I wished I’d had a camera to stick out. And if wishes were dishes, we’d all eat.

  “Hao,” I said. “Give me the sling from your gun.”

  She unclipped the meter-long black belt of woven reinforced polymer without arguing. I tied my spare tea bottle to it, then pushed it past the edge of our makeshift bunker. Maybe the grunts had withdrawn.

  Something flashed by the door, and a small, black dot was momentarily visible. Grenade. I yanked back my tea bottle and looked through the crack in the crucible.

  The grenade exploded soundlessly. Moments later, fragments pinged into the crucible and walls. So much for the grunts withdrawing.

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  Why weren’t they coming?

  If I had the manpower, and knew where my quarry was, and didn’t care about wasting lives, I’d rush in. Get some wards up front, or the mage, make him safe with a volume of gunfire. Have him diffuse the wards, then hit back with force. If he was willing to burn his mind in order to power the ripstone, he would have overwhelmed me easily. I’m skilled, not strong.

  Where were they? Why weren’t they coming? Dordolio hadn’t seemed hesitant to throw away his grunts.

  I tapped into the Bucket’s sensors, wishing I had my full wardnet. I could have spied on the grunts, tracked their movements, maybe. All I saw were the fuzzy blobs of the ships, moving around.

  Moving. The ships were moving. The big ship was moving behind the small one, while the small one was traveling along the edge of the breaking yard.

  What the crud was Dordolio doing?

  Suddenly, the small ship flashed with white lines. The hairs on my arms rose. The hatchling whimpered in his sleep.

  Ripstone. Dordolio had decided to dig us out.