Or perhaps I am just trying to comfort myself while on this fool's errand, Darkblade thought bitterly. Gritting his teeth for the third time that day, Darkblade forced himself to fly onward. Nalshanda would sense him if he turned back toward the station, and Darkblade had no desire to start a fight he knew he'd lose.
So he turned his mind to his task, and tried not to feel the burning rage that threatened to consume him whenever he thought too much about it. A hunter should not be distracted by such things. All he had to do right now was find the black ship and follow it.
Such a simple matter, really.
The glow of his eyes faded slowly as Darkblade let the murderous rage slip away. Sighing softly he accelerated further, ripping through space for as long as his body could sustain that kind of speed. Finally tiring, Darkblade stopped and considered his next move.
The most rational place to look for the Sub-Visser was on the planet where they had first encountered one another. However, he had not left the Sub-Visser in the most rational of moods. Perhaps he had already departed. And then again, perhaps he had not.
I suppose there is no harm in searching.
With that unspoken decision, Darkblade turned back towards the desert world. Flying slowly at first so as to give his body time to regain the strength he had expended in that initial burst. After he felt refreshed enough, Darkblade accelerated a bit, careful not to push himself too far too soon.
Retracing the path he had taken brought him once again to the desert world of the Taxxons. Hovering above the planet, he found it to be just as unappealing as when he'd left it. Diving through the atmosphere, feeling the heat of the flames, and landing invisibly on the surface brought back many memories.
Most of them were unwelcome, and so it was with some hesitation that Darkblade opened his mind partway and started to search. Briefly touching the minds of every Hork-Bajir Controller he encountered, Darkblade soon discovered that his initial assessment had been correct. The Sub-Visser was still on the planet, that made Darkblade's task somewhat easier.
At least I will not be required to hunt him down through the cosmos.
Sighing inaudibly, he continued walking. The thoughts of the Yeerks were on the strange armored creature that had attacked them earlier. None but himself and the Sub-Visser knew the reason, but even the Sub-Visser did not know the true identity of his attacker and one-time host.
The secret of the Radam could not be revealed to anyone, save the species' that they had conquered. Brushing past a shuffling Taxxon, Darkblade caught the tail end of a thought. Something about robots.
Darkblade dismissed it. Finally Darkblade sensed a familiar thought pattern, turning toward the source he caught sight of five Hork-Bajir Controllers. One seemed to be giving the other four orders, mixed in with a copious amount of threats. Darkblade instantly recognized that style of so-called command.
Ahh, my old friend the Sub-Visser. Darkblade thought derisively.
Slipping quietly in behind the five, Darkblade followed them at a discreet distance. The argument had been resolved with the killing of one of the underling Hork-Bajir, which had quickly shut the other three up. The Sub-Visser wanted to get on his ship and leave this planet. And he didn't seem to care that it would defy his superior's orders if he did so.
Jumping to give himself the necessary height, Darkblade flew alongside the four remaining Hork-Bajir Controllers. They came to their ship in short order, one of those elegant black ships. Darkblade smiled under his helmet, feeling somewhat pleased that he would be traveling on one of those ships and not on the ugly ovoid ships with the spears sticking out of the front.
Picking out a nice secluded spot, just under the left blade, he hovered there. Retrieving the tek-seed, he pressed it up against the hull and watched as small tendrils grew from the bottom, anchoring the seed to the ship. The advantage of Radam biotechnology was that it needed very little time in atmosphere to survive, and could be sustained on the bioenergy from a Teknoman. Watching the Controllers board their ship, Darkblade prepared to leave the planet for the second time.
He heard the roar of the engines and pushed his own rockets, soaring with the ship as it accelerated out of the atmosphere. His eyes flashed, a small sign of just how confident he was. He knew he would have to retire to the safety of the pod, once the seed had grown into one, but for now he was content to fly along unnoticed beneath the ship.
Letting himself slip into a sort of trance, which was useful when he was in transit on long reconnaissance missions, and moreso now that he was wont to be so occupied more often then not lately. His body seemed to separate from his mind, leaving it operating on a kind of autopilot. And leaving his mind free to wander where it chose.
As so often before, his thoughts turned to Omega. Darkblade almost stopped breathing, why did his thoughts stray so much to his absent commander? It had been thousands of years since they had last seen one another, so why could Darkblade call to mind in such vivid detail the sound of his voice? Shaking off those errant musings, Darkblade came out of his trance. Sometimes it was best not to think.
It was some time later that he noticed it, but by then the ship was clearly heading for the Taxxon world again. Darkblade figured that one of the Sub-Visser's superiors had learned of his defiance and ordered him to remain at his post. It had happened to Darkblade himself often enough, but only while he had been serving under Nalshanda.
Omega had been perfectly willing to place him somewhere else if he wandered away from a particularly uninteresting assignment. Darkblade shook his head, cutting off that chain of thought before it could become anything more that a comparison between his two commanders. They were soon back on the Taxxon planet.
Bored, but not particularly wanting to fight off Hork-Bajir or Taxxons, Darkblade cloaked. For lack of anything better to do, Darkblade turned his attention to the seed. It was beginning to grow, pulsing softly as it expanded, and he could see it subtly shifting colors. The hue darkening from the orange-red of an immature seed to the purplish-magenta of a mature teknopod.
His othersense twinged briefly, and he turned to stare at the horizon. Something was happening, something important, though in what way Darkblade couldn't be sure. But the feeling soon passed, and Darkblade didn't pause to consider it.