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  “Have you met Ensign Pren?” Moray asked Jordan.

  “She did,” Kào interjected. “Indirectly.”

  Jordan’s uneasy gaze settled on the ensign, specifically on the almost-clear support strip gracing the bridge of the woman’s nose. Both women’s faces reflected what appeared to be forced neutrality.

  Kào contemplated his folded hands as Moray began to describe the Savior and its mission. “We are a military warship tasked with providing protection for vessels traversing the border between the settled areas and uncharted space. Secondary to that is exploration and the charting of undiscovered worlds, such as your Earth.”

  Jordan regarded him stonily. “State your reason for detaining my ship.”

  Moray seemed caught off balance; no one spoke to him in that tone. Kào winced even as he found himself secretly admiring Jordan’s grit.

  “Shall I explain?” Kào offered when Moray didn’t immediately reply.

  Moray held up one hand. “I’m afraid I have bad news,” he said at last.

  Jordan sat as still as a statue as she read the translation: “Earth, as you knew it, is gone.”

  Seconds ticked by. Then she recoiled, as though struck.

  Kào’s jaw knotted. He’d always been a fan of bluntness, of not mincing words. Humans and computers, he dealt with them the same way: in a straightforward and consistent manner. Yet, this time, he felt an overwhelming urge to soften the blow dealt by his father.

  “What . . . happened?” Jordan’s voice was hoarse but steady.

  “At times, and thankfully not often, an inhabited planet will cross paths with a comet or asteroid. That is what happened to your home.”

  “It’s a mistake,” Jordan protested. “The astronomers always watch the sky. We would have seen it coming. We would have had warnings.”

  The commodore hefted his large frame off of his chair and walked to the window, where there wasn’t much to view other than a distorted starscape. “That is not always the case with what is known as a comet shower,” he argued. Behind him, Jordan looked lonely and lost in her small chair at the enormous conference table. “They are less dense than asteroids, made of dust and ice as opposed to rock and iron. If they fragment before coming into viewing range, there would be no warning at all, unless your civilization utilized long-range space buoys for early detection, which you did not. It was just such a comet shower that struck your Earth.” Sorrow deepened the creases between Kào’s father’s bushy brows. “I wish I could have saved more of you.”

  Excruciating minutes ticked past while Jordan deciphered all Moray had told her. After experiencing the conversion-glasses, Kào knew that not all of what was said translated properly. But enough would be displayed as captions for Jordan to discern Kào’s father’s meaning. “But there’ll be survivors,” she insisted. “There always are.”

  The futile hope that infused her voice made Kào’s chest ache.

  “There are so many places to hide,” she maintained. “Underground shelters, buildings—”

  “No, Captain. These relatively small and less-dense objects, the remains of a comet, are actually the most dangerous of the hazards from space. They break up into pieces that explode just above the ground, a mile or so, no more.”

  The optimum altitude for maximum devastation, Kào knew from his years as a weapons officer for the Alliance.

  “There were nine major impacts, Captain Cady, and hundreds of smaller ones. They left behind a wasteland of flattened, charred buildings and blackened corpses. The oceans vaporized, infernos raged. Within a short time, what was left of the atmosphere was so thickly laden with particles that sunlight couldn’t reach the surface. And it won’t, I’m afraid, for centuries.”

  Jordan absorbed Moray’s bleak assessment. Kào’s watch chimed the third-hour, a cheerful sound at odds with the miserable mood in the room.

  The Earth leader’s mouth trembled. Then she lifted her glasses to swipe her knuckles across her cheek.

  Moray appeared to be at a loss for words, as well. Even Trist acted uncomfortable.

  Enough. Kào may have handed over the reins of this meeting to his father, but Jordan’s suffering compelled him to take them back. She’d learned of her home world’s fate; why prolong the misery? “I think we have accomplished most of what we set out to do, Commodore,” he said tactfully. “Now it is time for me to return Captain Cady to her people.”

  But Moray held up his hand, stopping Kào. “How many people were on your vessel, Captain Cady?”

  Jordan turned her eyes to Kào before she answered. She’d seen the interchange; she understood what he’d tried to do. “Two hundred and ninety-one,” she said tightly. “But that includes the captain—the original captain. He’s dead.”

  “I am sorry,” Moray murmured. “There are two hundred and ninety total, then.” After translating the figures and typing the information into his handheld computer, Moray continued with more questions: numbers of infants, children, ages, and the general health of Jordan’s people.

  Kào found it odd that Moray was so concerned with these details when a staff member could have passed the information along to him later. His father took too much onto his shoulders. He always had. By the Seeders, the least Kào could do for the man was lighten the load.

  This time he stood. “Sir, you have duties that demand your attention. I can pass along the rest of this information later. I thank you for participating in the briefing, and for sharing your expertise in these matters. And you, Ensign Pren, for the conversion-glasses that made this briefing possible. Any questions? No? Good.”

  As Moray sat back in his chair, clearly surprised by the abruptness with which Kào ended the meeting, Trist removed the glasses covering her crimson eyes and gaped at him. Kào told her, “I want to keep two pair of glasses for Captain Cady and myself. I’ll have them returned to you later. I expect you’ll want to download additional data for your language program.”

  Her voice was still nasal. “The instructional program is by no means perfected as yet. I’ve had some trouble with the phonics. But it will suffice. For now.”

  “I’m sure it will more than suffice,” Kào assured her.

  The woman appeared all at once baffled, pleased, and troubled by his compliment. With a furtive glance at Moray, she gathered her items and left the room.

  Kào spoke to Jordan next. “If you’ll excuse us for a moment, Captain. Commodore Moray and I must confer privately.”

  Moray pushed himself out of the floating chair, slowly, as big men do. He did a reasonable job of hiding his displeasure at his son’s curtailing of the briefing. “Please accept my deepest condolences, Captain Cady. Mr. Vantaar-Moray is the primary intercessor between your people and my crew. I hope you will cooperate with him. It is ultimately the best option for your people.”

  She took longer than usual to read the translation. “I understand.”

  Moray raised his brows at Kào. Ensure that she does, his eyes said.

  Kào followed the commodore to just outside the hatch. Moray’s aides converged on them, but Moray waved them off when they tried to crowd around him. He tore off his glasses. “You cut short the briefing. Why?”

  Kào removed his own conversion-glasses. “I’m sorry, sir,” he said, though he wasn’t, really. “She’s endured about all she can. I need her in reasonable condition to brief her own people. If we went on much longer, she wouldn’t be.”

  “A valid point.” Moray rubbed one hand over his face and released a sigh. “Ah, Kào. I’m weary and in need of sleep.”

  “Ah, and who isn’t?”

  They regarded each other with warmth. Then Moray turned serious. “I’ve ordered a lockdown, you know.”

  It meant the refugees would be confined to their quarters—for an unknown length of time. There had been no word yet on where or when the Earthers would be dropped off at a resettlement port. “Is that necessary?”

  “Your job will be much easier because of it, Kào,” his father i
nsisted. “With the Talagar situation the way it is here in the Perimeter, I can’t afford unrest on my own ship. Should there be any unrest, you are authorized to use force to subdue it. Use as many of my security team as you require.”

  “Yes, sir.” But he was shocked by the strain he saw in his father’s face.

  “If you need me I’ll be on the bridge.” Moray’s troubled gray eyes sharpened with worry. “Be careful, Kào.”

  “Don’t worry, sir.”

  I’m an ex-prisoner made jailer, he thought as Moray strode away into a huddle of waiting aides. Not only unpalatable, the concept bordered on ludicrous.

  He slid his glasses back over his eyes and returned to the meeting room. “Door—close,” he commanded. The door whooshed shut.

  Aware that Jordan followed him with her gaze, Kào filled a tumbler with water from the dispenser in the wall and set it in front of her. Then he returned to his chair. “Drink,” he commanded.

  Her fingers curved around the opaque white glass, but not before he saw them quiver. It took all he had not to cover her hands with his. She’d lost everything. Just as he had. He was a stranger to offering comfort, but something about this particular woman, and what they shared, drove him to try.

  “You have someone on Earth—had someone,” he amended. Her shoulders went rigid. He searched for a generic word to use to accommodate the religious and cultural differences between their societies. “You had a . . . mate.”

  Jordan read his words and flinched. Kào longed to pull the glasses off her face and see what was in her eyes. “No, no mate. A daughter . . . a six-year-old child,” she whispered. She took a breath, and then another. “Oh, God. I loved her so much. . . .” A choked sob escaped her. She pressed one hand to her mouth.

  He stared at her, unable to fathom the depth of her grief, to grasp what it might be like to be so close to someone that losing them tore you apart. He and Moray shared a loving father-son relationship; yet somehow, if Moray were to die, Kào doubted he was capable of feeling what Jordan so clearly did now. There was no question that’d he’d do whatever his father asked—blast, he’d give his life for the man—but he feared that that stemmed more from intense loyalty and obligation than from deep emotion; it was less a symptom of Moray’s parenting than it was Kào’s inability to conjure intense feelings. Even before the war and his imprisonment, Kào had felt oddly hollow, as if something once there was gone. Fondness for his birth family, and theirs for him, he imagined privately. But he’d admitted that notion to no one; it was illogical to mourn something of which you had no recollection.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” he offered awkwardly. Her nostrils flared, and she pressed her fist into her stomach. Blast, he was mucking this up.

  “It should have been me.” Her knuckles turned white. “Not her.”

  It should have been me. Dark memories clotted Kào’s mind, memories of Talagar prison. He’d been the only one of his captured squadron-mates to survive it. Why? Why had he lived when others were more deserving? The question had haunted him since his release, stealing his sleep and, when he did sleep, invading his dreams.

  He studied the patchwork of faint scars on the back of his right hand. “Some say that it’s worse to be the one left alive.”

  Her head lifted. Had she recognized the pain behind that statement? His neck muscles bunched. “Drink,” he ordered.

  She sipped some water and clumsily set the tumbler back on the table. The clatter was overly loud in the heavy silence. She stared at her hands until she’d composed herself. He knew she would. She was in charge; she couldn’t give in to personal pain, no matter what the cost. Kào knew all about that.

  One of his father’s Talagarian aides—or, more correctly, an aide of Talagar ancestry—peeked inside the meeting room. He blurted an apology and ducked out of sight.

  Kào returned his attention to Jordan. “Shall we go to your people now?”

  Her distaste at breaking the news to them drew her lips into a tight grimace. With equal dislike, she pushed out of the buoyant chair, leaving it bobbing gently as she followed Kào from the meeting room.

  “They are being brought to supplementary crew quarters on deck Sublevel Three,” he explained as they walked. “There you will be confined until further notice.”

  After reading the translation, she glanced sideways at him, her accusing gaze as stinging as a slap. “I thought we weren’t captives.”

  “You are not!”

  “But if we can’t leave where you’re putting us, then what else are we? And why don’t you look happy about it?”

  It seemed that he couldn’t mask his expressions any more than she could hers.

  He tried to determine the best way to explain that the lockdown wasn’t his idea without revealing his aversion to the order itself. He was serving his father. This wasn’t war, but the outcome was just as important to his father’s future. As in battle, to achieve victory, it was imperative that they all present a united front, regardless of personal opinion. “It’s in your best interests to stay within the safety of your quarters. It would be easy to be injured, wandering around a strange ship—”

  “Tell me the truth.”

  His head jerked around. Her eyes blazed, challenging him. He exhaled, turning his gaze to the far side of the ship, focusing somewhere she couldn’t see. “You know nothing of the Talagars. Or the war.”

  Her tone wasn’t as steady. “No.”

  What innocence. He envied it. And then he ended it.

  He told her of the Talagar Empire and the war, though not his role in it. By the time he’d finished explaining what the Savior was doing in the Perimeter, she’d paled. Her gaze darted around the corridor, as if she were certain an attack was imminent.

  Let her feel that fear, he reasoned. It might save her life someday.

  Then he shored up her apprehension, feeling no guilt as he did so. “The Talagars would think you and your people the perfect prey, Jordan. Dependent, unaware of galactic politics, and possessed of no identification records in the universal database. This is a hazardous zone we traverse. None of us dreamed we’d be transporting refugees through it.” Particularly me. “I hope that Headquarters makes a swift decision as to where you’re to be relocated.”

  “So do I,” she murmured, appearing downright ill. Her mourning threatened to break through her façade.

  As they made their way down to Sublevel Three through largely deserted corridors—the small size of the crew was noticeable on a ship this size—he sought to reassure her. “But we’ll meet daily. Your meals will be delivered; clothing will be provided; all your needs will be met. And as your primary intercessor, I’ll be able to provision anything else you might need.”

  But it was clear by her deepening scowl that the prospect of captivity while onboard the ship didn’t please her. He hadn’t anticipated otherwise. But what he hadn’t expected was her refusal to pass on that information to her people. “They’re scared enough as it is. I can’t tell them that they’re prisoners, too.”

  “Not prisoners. Confined for their own protection.”

  She made a face. “Protection against a slave-owning empire of sore losers bent on fighting until the end? Hmm. It’ll be tough enough dealing with what I’m going to tell them now. If I heap on any more, they’ll panic.” Her face contorted in concentration. Then she brightened, as much as shock and fatigue would allow. “We’ll be in quarantine.”

  “Quarantine? You needn’t worry about protecting the crew of the Savior from unknown diseases.”

  “Actually, I had in mind that my people needed to be protected from yours.”

  Kào thought he sensed a hint of haughtiness in that comment. Or was she goading him, as he’d done to her in his father’s meeting room? But it was her sly dodging of his request to tell her people of the lockdown that bemused him. “Just so you’re aware, our medical staff can accommodate any differences in our physiology,” he explained.

  “Swapping diseases is stil
l a risk. We’re different species.” Her eyes slid sideways. “Though you look so . . . human.”

  “I am human.” He covered his incredulity that this basic fact was news to her, that Earth didn’t know of their common heritage.

  “I thought because you were from another planet that you’d be . . . something else.”

  “No. There are many different races, displaying many different characteristics, but all are human. We are the Progeny—you, me, and the rest, even the Talagars. All are descendants of the Original Ones. The Seeders, we call them. Several hundred thousand years ago, they sowed their DNA across the galaxy. It was their legacy. Human DNA. We are the same people, Jordan, the same species. That you don’t know this explains your initial fear of me. And it corroborates the commodore’s theory that your world was separated from the Alliance long ago, before your recorded history.” He watched as she absorbed the translation. “I don’t know how Earth became separated,” he admitted. “Or why. I have my theories, but that discussion is best saved for another day.”

  I agree, her overwhelmed expression told him. “When everything’s more stable, I’ll brief them on the truth, Kào. That we’re in danger flying through this area.” She paused, and then said, “And there’s something else, too.”

  Something had told him there’d be more. This day would never end. “What is it?”

  “Part of why my people were scared on the airplane was because they were scared . . . of you.”

  He opened his mouth to argue, then reconsidered. He’d been told that his looks could be rather, ah, intimidating. That had served him well in the arena of war, but this was a situation that required diplomacy and patience, neither of which were his strong points. “So you think that calling your confinement ‘quarantine’ as opposed to a lockdown will make them more inclined to trust me.”

  “And that will make them more inclined to cooperate.”