Night turned the blue sky to black. Past the cold glass, the sky was a wash of stars – remote, unreachable – brightened by the lone moon, pink, pocked Tike Teke.

Traejan sank into a big soft chair, numbly sipping Kyso’s drinks, while the other two talked over trivialities. He stared at the darkening world, thinking of the past. Beyond his sight, he heard Althea say she was tired; heard her thank Kyso; then heard the quiet sounds of her departure.

He shifted around to watch her leave. She turned back – their eyes met. She offered a brief smile, then turned away. Kyso bade her a friendly goodnight, then aimed a sharp eye back to him. The old man rose to his feet, put his own empty glass down. Traejan turned back to the view, heard him pad across the carpet, watched the reflection of his approach.

“I do not understand you, boy. You risk your life, my life,” his voice rose with angry dismay, “to get that woman back here. And now, you decide to insult the best chance we have ever had!”

He loomed over Traejan, glowering.

“That we may ever have!”

Taking in a deep breath, he looked away. Kyso had been completely taken in. He… He just couldn’t see it. He looked back up at the man standing over him. It was a strecking fantasy. He rose to face the man, drunk and unsteady, but filled with the strength of his convictions.

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“She’s one woman,” he replied. Couldn’t Kyso see it? “Even if she has Consortia geneering or ‘nanometric networks’ in her – it’s a big jump from surviving frostbite, healing fractures to taking on bots and flyers and–!”

The Monstrous thing that filled the sky, blotted out the sun – destroyed everything and everyone…

“And we’re just going along with whatever she says? Forget everything? When she’s hardly answered for any of it?”

He looked Kyso in his eyes, satisfied at seeing the old man taken aback, but still, refusing to agree.

“She is Consortia – not a bloody scavenger! Everything she has said – has told us – has had the ring of truth,” he chastised. “Wake the streck up! You can’t pile everything that’s happened in the last two hundred years on her.”

“But she is Consortia. Who else do we have we blame?” Traejan complained. “Where the hell were they when we needed them?!”

“I think she explained that.”

Traejan waved his hand in a quick, angry gesture. He wasn’t going to be dismissed him again.

“Althea Ram,” he continued. “She can just upload her little corruption that can destroy every single bot and flyer – like they are nothing?! I want to believe this, I really do. Maybe I would have before.”

Ten years ago, three.

“Now… After what I’ve… I just can’t see it.”

He looked back out to the darkness.

“It’ll go wrong, Kyso” he added, feeling the heavy weight of memory. “It always goes wrong.”