Page 45 of Neverwylde 6
“Oh, sweet heavens, what isthat?” Williamsburg exclaimed.
Jules paused the shot. “That is what we call a Hoov.”
“Those bastards are at least seven feet tall and voracious meat eaters,” Mellori explained.
“And they’re intelligent bastards,” Cooter added.
“One of them was wearing a translation necklace,” Sandow commented.
Kelen inserted, “Believe it or not, they weren’t the worst that planet had to offer.”
They perused another fifty or so still frames before Pfeiffer asked Jules to close down the graphics. Kelen noticed how pale the three officers’ faces were.
The colonel dropped into his seat. “You were damned lucky to get off that planet when you did.”
“We agree,” Kyber concurred. “We doubted we would have lasted another couple of weeks if Duruk had not honed in on our signal.”
Pfeiffer gave him a confused look, but it was Baffrey who remarked, “Signal? Am I missing something? I thought you said during your interrogations that your lifepods landed on the planet. That your ship was swallowed up by the tegris.”
“It was, and we did.”
“Then what signal are you talking about?”
Pfeiffer waved a hand for attention. “Let’s clear a bit of confusion here. Kyber, you said your ship sent out a distress signal when it came in contact with the wormhole, right?”
“Correct.”
“So how was Duruk able to pinpoint your location on the planet?”
Kyber pointed to Dox. “He built a transmitter out of odd parts we found.”
“Youfound?” Baffrey repeated.
“Yeah. Hold on. I have a vid here.” Jules rifled through the tablet’s databank, then turned the holo back on for them to watch. It was a slow scan of the room where they’d found the piles and piles of confiscated goods Hoov and its people had collected and stored. Every so often the camera zoomed in on one of them, including a lingering shot of Dox pulling out several unidentifiable items and stuffing them inside his uniform.
Pfeiffer turned to Dox. “Where is that transmitter?”
“They took it.”
“They who? Duruk?”
Dox gave a single nod. “Said it was Bollian.”
The colonel stiffened. “Did you say Bollian?”
Kelen sensed her husband alerting to the man’s unease. “Is that supposed to mean something?”
Pfeiffer turned to her. “Are any of you familiar with the Prai Mer Principle?”
She shook her head, as did Kyber and several others, but Mellori raised his hand.
“I am. It’s supposed to solve the problem of the teleportation of matter over extreme distances.” Seeing that the other crewmembers weren’t connecting, he cleared his throat and tried again. “Right now in order to get from point A to point B, you have to take a ship and travel for days and weeks on end to get there. Unless, of course, you happen to find a wormhole that kind of takes you in and spits you out close to your destination. But we all know that sort of phenomenon happens more frequently in fiction than in actuality.
“Rumor says the Prai Mer Principle was developed by the Bollians. According to what we know, they claimed they could transport solidand livingmatter from one location to ano—”
The engineer paused as everyone realized what he was saying. Kelen saw Kyber glance at her, then exchange looks with the others. Pfeiffer noticed their expressions.
“What?”
