Besides which, down deep, Draycos had to concede that Uncle Virge wasn't being entirely unfair. With the lives of his people at stake, Draycos perhaps was pushing a little too hard.
But what else could he do?
"I know you want this to work, Draycos," Jack said, running his fingers through his hair again, still without improving the mess. "But face it. This approach just isn't working."
"I agree," Uncle Virge said. "And frankly, I can't see how it ever will. There are just too many Djinn-90s flying around the Orion Arm for us to hunt down the records of all of them. More to the point, there are too many that have changed hands under, shall we way, unofficial circumstances. No matter how many manufacturing records or registration listings we dig up, we still won't have them all."
"Then we need a different approach," Jack concluded. "Draycos, you seem convinced they were mercenaries. How come?"
"I saw them function in battle," Draycos reminded him, the tip of his tail making slow circles as he studied Jack's face in the dim light. The boy's expression was tense, as if he was screwing up his courage toward an unpleasant decision he didn't want to make.
But if that decision was to back away, this was an odd way of leading up to it. "Twice, in fact, both in their attack on our ships and later during our escape from the planet," he went on. "Their maneuvering and tactics were quite professional."
"Doesn't mean they're necessarily soldiers for hire," Uncle Virge argued, his voice gone suddenly cautious. Perhaps he'd picked up on Jack's expression, too. "Maybe they're someone's official military. Maybe some planet has made a deal with your Valahgua enemies."
"An official military would have had backup forces ready," Draycos pointed out.