"This is a bad idea," Hao said.

  "How would you know?" I said. The sun shone down into the Gash, illuminating the length of it. Black stone. Dun sand. Rocks piled up on the ledges, creating low growing beds filled with scraggly looking bushes, grasses, vines. Some kinds of berries or tubers. None of them seemed to be in fruit. A few pipes, here and there, going down to the bottom of the Gash, sinking below the sand. Fifty, maybe sixty meters down. I was glad we'd entered during the night. It was a miracle nobody had fallen to their deaths.

  People fumbled around on the ledges, hugging the cliff faces, pressing themselves to the stone whenever the wind gusted down into the Gash. Watering the plants from cans, occasionally lifting a branch, mostly putting it down again without finding anything. Voidmucking way to live.

  "I know because you laughed it away," Hao said. "Said that I watch too many adventure vids. Made a very big point of that. What are you going to do with a broken space ship anyway?"

  "So I lied," I said. "And not broken, just in need of a refit. They'll land it in one of the repair docks in the port. A cruiser-sized long hauler would fit tens of thousands."

  Hao brightened, her too-blue eyes, sparkling in the sunlight.

  "I knew it," she said. "You can do real magic."

  Ignoring the practical details of storming a ship full of Syndics, because there was magic in the works. That was Hao's love of adventure vids talking. But those stupid stories were making her happy, even here, hunted in the middle of a desert. I'd have to watch one someday, see what she saw in them. But now I had to dampen her enthusiasm before she expected me to fly, or channel the sun, or something.

  "Sort of lied," I corrected.

  "You're going to blow up a ship in orbit," Hao said. "How is that not real magic?"

  Her too-blue eyes glittered, her grin split her face, showing white teeth. Pure, childish glee. It was too much for me. I laughed, swept up by her enthusiasm. The laughter echoed on the wind, carrying through the Gash. Surprised faces looked up, pale dots in the depths of the ravine. It quieted me. This wasn't a place where people laughed.

  "I'm going to create a sympathetic bond to one of the warpstones in the long hauler's engines," I said. "I'll need to get close enough to the Bucket to bind my wards there and channel the warpstone in our engines. As long as both engines are running, I can reflect the harmonies into the engine in the hauler. Then I'm going to shatter it and hope that the backlash doesn't shatter my rifle or my mind."

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  "And if it does?" Hao said, losing her cheerfulness. "Will we notice it?"

  I shrugged, trying to look casual. Maybe I succeeded. Likely not. It was a crazy plan. My hands shook.

  "Mage-twisted aren't real," I said, "Frying your brain doesn't alter your personality. My mind shatters, I become a vegetable. You'll notice. Rifle shatters, there will be a very big bang, and a bigger hole. You'll definitely notice."

  Hao put a hand on mine. Her hands were very big, rough from her work. Nice.

  "Stay alive," she said, "and I'll buy you a cup of tea."

  I laughed again, causing more stares. I didn't care. Laughter is what life is all about.

  "Deal," I said. "And if I fry my brain, you'll put a bullet through it."

  "No," Hao said.

  That stopped me.

  "No?" I repeated.

  "No, I won't kill you," she said. "I signed on as your crew, remember?"

  I remembered. It had meant a lot to her back then. I was starting to understand how much. It was starting to mean more to me, too.

  "I won't ask it of you," I said. "But you know my wish."

  "To the void with your wish," Hao said. "Not killing crewmates."

  "Check," I said. I’d probably manage to kill myself just fine. Crazy plan.

  We stared out into the Gash, the wind throwing sand at us.

  "So what happens after?" Hao said. "How do you intend to get all these people on board?"

  That was the question, wasn't it? Getting a ship down was only the first step. We'd need to get them to the port. Commandeer the ship. Get off the planet without being blown to pieces.

  "I don't know," I said. "I can blow up the missile packs. Put a shot through them with my rifle."

  Another crazy plan. How many shots did I have in me before I fumbled, let a thread slide and fried myself? Hao grinned.

  "Magic," she said.

  "Science," I countered. "There's no magic in aiming a gun. A magerifle shoots through the void, that's all."

  "Still magic," Hao insisted.

  "Real magic," I said. "Not something from your vids."

  "Except for the blowing things up through armored concrete," Hao said with a grin.

  Crazy to the void. I grinned back. Spare me kids and mechanics.

  "How long to rebuild the engine pod?" I said, bringing her back to the practicalities.

  Hao stared off into the gorge.

  "A month or more," she said. "The rebuilding will go in a few days, sealing up the hull and shoving a new set of engines in. The re-balancing will take time. Maybe a couple of weeks, if they're happy to have it run choppy. Depends on if they've got all the parts or need to manufacture them to spec. It's the cruisers that worry me."

  "So we use the missiles to blow the cruisers," I said. "There has to be a command center somewhere. We'll know once we recce the port."

  "Might work," Hao said.

  "Or it may not work at all," I said. "If those ships have gone into a higher orbit, I won't be able to reach them, no matter what. Or if the engines aren't active. It's a small chance."

  "The biggest one these people will ever get," Hao said.

  I nodded.

  "Let's hope they'll see it this way," I said. "We'll need their help to get close enough to the port."