Drone Swarm Tactics

"A battle in space is often decided before it is begun. Control of the physical area is almost immaterial, as there are rarely meaningful barriers. Control of time, however, is of the utmost importance. A ship that can jump, even once, is a ship that will survive or win an engagement against a ship that cannot. If you come into a battle without your jump, you risk utter annihilation."

-from Captain Strauss of the Next Engagement: a Guild Memoir by Strauss Kalzenek

Sid sat on his bed in the guest quarters of the Vortex, flipping Yan's book over and over in his hands. He had at first hesitated to break the lines of power that she had inscribed into it, wanting to keep that connection to her. He supposed that Halen felt the same way, which was why he kept that fishbowl in his Stonecourt apartment. Still, it was a dangerous sort of thing to have laying around, so, with some regret, he had used his own power to blur and wipe away the remnants of Yan's, leaving just a book.

He had read the story, of course. He didn't entirely know what it was supposed to say. Obviously parts of it were direct comparisons to Yan's own journey: she had been helped by some people on the planet that she had been kidnapped to, and she wanted to stop the hostilities. That was clear. The characters that danced around the little narrative didn't seem to represent anyone in particular, though he had searched for anyone he could consider himself. Maybe he was the twin brother? The thought made him shake his head; it seemed unlikely. Yan had to know that there was no way she could convince him to join her side, right? Still, he couldn't stop thinking about it, reading it over and over, just like he had looked at every shred of evidence she had left. What was he trying to piece together? He couldn't quite tell.

His phone vibrated on the bed next to him.

>I'm outside your door.

Ervantes.

Sid pulled it open with a smile, letting Ervantes in.

"Well, we're away from Hanathue," Ervantes said. "Home again, home again."

Sid flopped back down on his bed and Ervantes took the desk chair, sitting in it backwards, spindly legs sprawled wide.

"What's that face for?" Ervantes asked when Sid didn't respond.

"I'm torn."

"About?"

"Asking forgiveness and asking permission."

"I would generally go for permission." Ervantes leaned forward, tipping the chair so that his knees knocked against the side of Sid's bed.

"By time we're in position to ask for permission, it will be too late."

"And did you wait until we jumped out of ansible range for precisely that reason?"

Sid bared his teeth and rolled onto his back, holding the book against his chest. "You know me a little too well. That's dangerous."

"It doesn't take a genius."

"So what will be the consequences if you can't get forgiveness?" Ervantes asked. "If permission is so out of the question."

"I don't know."

"Let me maybe ask a more pertinent question: what exactly is it you want me to talk you into or out of?"

Sid closed his eyes, once again making it so that he and his words were the only things in the universe. Ervantes couldn't interrupt him until he finished, and he didn't want to see Ervantes's reaction until he was done either.

"You know we think that Yan is supposed to be meeting at Xuanhuan, the black station, right?" He didn't wait for a response, because he couldn't get one. "A Fleet ship is supposed to go join up with the Guild's supership, to chase her down and destroy her. This is our chance. I have what I would need to convince the captain to turn us to Xuanhuan, so that I can face her." He paused. "I need to face her. I have to." He kept his eyes squeezed shut for a second, running his fingers over the raised surface of the metal image on the book's cover.

Ervantes tugged the book out of Sid's hand, with a slow and gentle touch. Sid opened his eyes and looked at him.

"Does she really mean that much to you?"

"Why, are you jealous?"

"Well, I don't know if I could say that if I betray you I hope you want to come hunt me down."

Sid had to laugh at that one. "You planning on betraying me?"

"Did BarCarran plan on it?"

Sid frowned and tensed up. "Don't say shit like that."

"Why not?"

"It makes me nervous."

"About?"

"That I don't know, she could somehow convince me that she's right."

"I somehow doubt that when the missiles start flying that you will feel that way anymore."

"So what are you saying? Should I do it?"

Ervantes paged through Yan's book without speaking.

"I need you to tell me," Sid demanded.

"Second Welslak, I cannot make your decisions for you."

Sid groaned and buried his face in his pillow. "You're useless."

Even with his face covered, the text that his glasses generated was still visible and inescapable. "At least I'm not running to the captain and telling her all of this. That's technically my duty. Keep you on a string."

"No, that's Hernan's job."

"Does Hernan know about this?"

"I think he suspects."

"And is he going to stop you?"

"I think he's very carefully not going to bring it up so that he has plausible deniability."

"And you've just removed mine by bringing it up to me."

Sid sighed and looked at him. "I'll make sure you don't get in trouble."

"You say that, but I somehow doubt that will be true if your own neck is on the line."

"Sandreas won't kick me out."

"I don't think you want to learn what the shortening of your long leash will feel like," Ervantes cautioned.

"If I can't use my leash when it's long, then what's the difference?" Sid asked. He rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling.

"You know, she might kill you," Ervantes said. "The First Star is well armed, and she's probably gotten a whole crew of pirates to join her on it."

"Don't say things that make sense," Sid said. "Let me live in my fantasy."

"And what fantasy is that in particular?"

"The one where she surrenders immediately."

"And then what do you think will happen?"

"I don't know, I never imagine anything after that."

"That's because you know it would suck. You think she's actually going to surrender, knowing that best case scenario, she's in a secret jail for the rest of her life?"

Sid scrunched his face up, a combination of anger, frustration, and ruefulness.

Ervantes continued to speak, apparently giving as good as he got when it came to Sid's monologues. "If I were Yan, which I'm not, and you came to fight me, I'd try to run. If I couldn't run, I'd fight until I couldn't fight anymore. If I lost, I'd kill myself, for real this time, and take as many people down with me as I could."

"Why?"

"I wouldn't want to go back to being a prisoner, or worse. You know she saw what Halen did to Mejia. I wouldn't want to go through anything like that, or what was coming."

"I don't think Halen would—"

Ervantes stared him down. "You don't?"

"So, what, if you think I don't want her to die, I shouldn't do this?"

"I think you need to either accept that she's an enemy, so that you can do what you need to do, or you need to accept that you're too biased to do anything about her. This is why First Sandreas didn't want you going after her in the first place."

"This tension is going to have to break someday," Sid said. He clenched his fists at his sides, digging his nails into his palms. "If not now, when?"

"If not you, who?" Ervantes's expression was remarkably dry.

"Don't tell me that someone else will take care of it."

"Someone else will take care of it. I've been told that being a leader is about delegating, not rushing headfirst into dangerous situations."

"You're talking like Sandreas."

"I don't know if I should take that as a compliment."

"It's just a statement of fact."

"And so what are you going to do, Sid?" Ervantes asked.

"Do you think it's a good idea to go after her?"

"No, absolutely not."

"Are you going to try to stop me?"

Ervantes sighed and rubbed his temples. "No."

"And are you going to be mad at me if I do?"

"If you get yourself killed, I'll be extremely angry."

"I'm invincible."

"No, you're not."

It took no small amount of convincing to get Captain Slater to agree to turn the Vortex towards Xuanhuan station. The secret of the First Star was still a secret to the vast majority of the Fleet, so Sid had to explain the whole truth, as well as pepper it with lies. It was necessary, he said, for it to be kept secret until they had departed Hanathue. He had plenty of documentation to back his story up, some real, some fake. The sum total of it was convincing enough to Captain Slater. He had imagined that it would be. After all, he was First Sandreas's apprentice. What reason would he have to lie? His official position gave him no direct command over Fleet movements, but in a very real sense, Sid spoke with Sandreas's authority, and Sandreas controlled the Fleet.

All the while, Hernan and Ervantes hadn't said anything.

Why Hernan didn't say anything to stop him, when he very well should have, Sid had his own ideas. Perhaps the feelings that Iri Maedes had so clearly had for him were not as one sided as Sid had thought, and her betrayal hurt deeply as well.

It was a questionable thing to do. A wrong thing to do, maybe. Sid had his second thoughts almost as soon as he stepped out of Captain Slater's ready room. The triumph of the moment fell away, and it was replaced with a doubt, a desire to turn around, a sudden wave of homesickness.

If Yan had been there, he would have asked her for advice. Ha.

Kino hadn't been nearly so slick about trying to change the captains' minds.

He was coiled tighter than a spring by time they actually arrived at Xuanhuan, and though Captain Slater had invited him onto the bridge to oversee the proceedings, he could tell that his anxious pacing and twitching arms made everyone want to kick him off.

Xuanhuan station was tucked inside the asteroid belt of an unassuming star system. One yellow dwarf star, one gas giant planet, one tiny terrestrial one, and the scattered remains of a third planet forming the asteroid belt in between. There was illicit mining going on throughout the belt, and one part of Xuanhuan formed a refinery, where the most valuable of the metals were processed and loaded on to pirate ships, to be sold around the Empire under the table.

The Vortex sat outside the edge of the system, running as cold as they could. Being a Fleet ship, they had plenty of resources at their disposal, including small drone ships that they sent out to monitor closer to the station. They were far enough away that they needed those drones as relays, and the drones were small enough that they would go unnoticed by even sophisticated monitoring systems that the station was sure to have.

It took a long time for the drones to go out and acquire any useful information about the station: what the current ships docked at it were (currently none), what its tiny army of mining vessels looked like and where they were positioned, how well defended the station was, what the radio chatter sounded like, et cetera. The knowledge came back at a trickle pace, and it drove Sid so crazy that he did have to leave the bridge at times, in order to remove himself from the waiting situation. What was he even waiting for? For Yan to jump in. But if he knew Yan, she wouldn't jump right in to the station anyway. She would hide the First Star somewhere far out and simply wait for Kino and Calor to meet back up with her.

If only they had managed to capture Calor. She would have that information. The situation would look a lot different if they had her.

The idea that Calor, Kino, and Yan could all be converging on this station from two different directions made him nervous. A Fleet ship (the Vortex had its own crew sensitive, plus Sid) was more than a match for them, but still...

And another thing. He was living in slight fear of the moment when the other Fleet ship, whichever ship it was supposed to be, showing up here on the real mission. Best case scenario, it would leave Emerri (or whatever port it had been in) before Sandreas figured out where Sid and the Vortex had vanished to. Worst case scenario, this new Fleet ship would be coming to drag Sid home kicking and screaming, and that would be sure to screw up the whole mission.

They waited.

Along with the drones near the station, the Vortex had, upon Sid's urging and explanation that the First Star would almost certainly not approach the station, deployed a different series of drones, these ones equipped with highly sensitive gravimeters, along the outer edge of the system. If a ship were to jump in, based on the changing readings on the gravimeters, they would be able to triangulate its location.

Obviously, they couldn't simply attack any ship that were to jump in indiscriminately, because they had no desire to engage with random pirate ships. Captain Slater said as much to Sid. Besides, Sid kept thinking about the Guild ship, and the other Fleet ship which were coming. The whole situation was... bad.

It was bad. It was wrong for Sid to be here, and he only grew more tense by the second, waiting for that fateful call to tell him that some ship had appeared.

Unfortunately for him, when he did get that call, it was the worst possible outcome. It wasn't the First Star. It was the Fleet ship Son of Emerri, which had snuck quietly into the outskirts of the system.

Because the Son of Emerri jumped in quite far from the Vortex, it made the process of identification and communication between the two ships difficult. The Vortex had no desire to use long range radio, as the amount of power that would require would alert Xuanhuan station to their presence, and the Son of Emerri had no idea that they were there. So they resorted to sending a shuttle with a real human courier to carry messages between the two vessels. The courier, being confined by the limits of human endurance and the speed of light, took a long time to travel between the two ships.

The message they sent told the Son of Emerri to jump to their position so that they could more easily discuss. It took a long, long time for the message to arrive. They might have jumped towards the Son of Emerri themselves, but judged that another ship jumping in so close was liable to be taken as a threat, so they didn't want to risk the chance of friendly fire.

The Son of Emerri did jump in, and Sid was summoned to the bridge to discuss and coordinate. He stood in front of the camera and smiled and did his best to not look too uncomfortable as he spoke with Captain Ombrau and Captain Slater.

"I must say, I didn't expect to encounter anyone else here," Ombrau said.

"It was a somewhat sudden change of plans," Sid said, squeezing his hand inside his coat pocket, digging his nails into his skin. At least Ombrau apparently hadn't been sent out with the knowledge that Sid shouldn't be there, but still.

"I see."

"Where is the Guild's ship?" Sid asked.

"They decided that they would not be jumping in," Ombrau said, a clear note of disdain on his face.

"Did they give a reason?"

"They had no desire to enter pirate territory," he said.

Sid scoffed. "As though they aren't three quarters of the way towards pirates themselves."

"Indeed. I believe the rationale is that they don't wish for their new little toy to be revealed to the pirates."

"You'd think that half the pirate world already knows about it, considering the number of supplies it took to build the thing."

"Perhaps. Regardless, they have no desire to enter the fray immediately."

"Immediately?"

"Should we find ourselves at a disadvantage," Ombrau said, indicating with his posture that he had no reason to believe that would occur, "we have their location, and can jump out and request backup."

"I think if any encounter with the First Star lasts longer than one jump cycle, the First Star will run."

"Of course," Ombrau said. "And the Guild's ship can chase them, along with yours." He nodded on the screen to Captain Slater.

"Our best bet is to hit them fast, before they can escape," Sid said.

"That will require us identifying them quickly."

"We still have our drones set up around the system," Slater said. "They should be able to identify the First Star within three hours of its arrival, regardless of its position."

"Good, good," Ombrau said. "I must admit, I'm glad to have support. I wasn't entirely happy with the idea of conducting a battle within the territory of a black station."

"It shouldn't pose an issue," Slater said. "We haven't seen any ships come and go."

"That doesn't mean that ships won't come and go," Ombrau said. "Pirates always do good business."

"What remains, then, is to decide how we shall station ourselves," Slater said.

Sid considered the situation. "Maybe it would be best if we stationed ourselves at opposite ends of this system, so that when they jump in, whichever one of us is closer at that point can send our shuttles out."

"And save our jump for when they escape?" Ombrau asked. "I don't hate the idea, but it leaves our shuttles vulnerable to them, without a place to retreat to."

Sid considered this. "I have a feeling that the First Star has very, very little strength. If we overwhelm them with shuttle force immediately..." He trailed off.

"Do you think that they could hold out long enough to jump away?" Slater asked. That was the real question.

"It depends entirely on how much of a crew has been picked up," Sid said. "They have one sensitive, which will make things unavoidably tricky, but they might not have enough force to launch their own shuttles."

"Is the First Star even equipped with a large number of dogfighters?" Slater asked.

"A few," Ombrau said. "If it were only a question of raw dogfighter strength, it would not even be a question."

"You have a sensitive on board your ship?" Slater asked.

"Yes, of course."

"Then we should be well matched, whichever one of us contacts the First Star first."

At that moment, the discussion between the two captains was interrupted as they received an alert that another ship had jumped into the system. Immediately, both ships were put on high readiness, should it be the First Star, and Ombrau and Slater disconnected the call, in order to prepare. The drones that had been sent out did not break radio silence, however, and the one drone that had provided positive identification of the ship showed it as a pirate vessel (unidentifiable from the outside, as most pirate ships were unmarked). That was confirmed when, approximately eight hours later, it jumped in and docked with Xuanhuan station. They hadn't been able to pick up any of the encrypted radio messages between the ship and the station, but it hardly mattered. While it was perhaps a complication to have pirate ships docking, it couldn't really be avoided, and, so long as they didn't notice the two Fleet ships, Sid thought that they should pose no difficulty.

The Son of Emerri later jumped to the other side of the system, after plans had been made and confirmed. That left the Vortex alone and silent once again, like a shark waiting just below the surface of the ocean to snag a swimmer in its jaws.

And, again, it was a waiting game.

Yan jumped the First Star in to the outskirts of Xuanhuan's station's system, feeling tense and nervous. As an extra precaution, she was using the Mother's invisibility power structure over the whole of the ship, keeping it invisible on all wavelengths of light. She didn't think that anyone would see the ship if she ran it cold, but this was an extra little guarantee. The least she could do to keep them all safe.

It had been almost a fortyday since she had last seen Sylva and Kino, and she had desperately hoped that they were doing okay. With the ominous warning that they were being followed from the Dark Hands, Yan was feeling absolutely no confidence in being in this star system. But she couldn't not come to meet up with Sylva and Kino. She needed them both back, and it would be a comfort beyond belief to have them with her.

Yan was on the bridge, speaking to Iri over the intercom. Iri was down in the shuttle bay, preparing to launch. Chanam was with her.

Iri had argued that Chanam should stay with Yan, for extra protection, but Yan had argued that Iri needed him more, and Yan had won the argument, on the basis that Chanam could keep Iri's shuttle invisible, even while she burned hot with acceleration. She would sneak close to Xuanhuan, then radio the station to inquire about landing and fetching Kino and Sylva. It wasn't ideal, but pirates were a fairly known quantity, and they didn't tend to ask too many questions, even of a shuttle that seemed to appear out of nowhere. They might just assume that it deployed new technology to store the heat from its engines, to keep it out of their view as it approached.

That was what Yan hoped would happen, anyway.

Through the scope, Yan could see that there was at least one pirate ship docked at the station, though at this distance, identification was completely impossible. The only reason that she knew that a ship was there was that when the station in its orbit passed between her and the system's star, she observed that it was lumpier than it had been when she had last seen it. That was about the limits of what they could pick up, at this distance.

Yan bid her goodbyes to Iri and Chanam, and they sped away, completely invisible as soon as they left the ship. That left Yan completely alone.

It was a terrible and vulnerable feeling, one that she hadn't thought would remind her so strongly of being in the Green King's prison, but it did. What made it slightly more bearable was the presence of the stardrive at the edge of her awareness. She could feel it gathering its strength to jump again, though she didn't think it would be physically possible for Iri and Chanam to retrieve Sylva and Kino before the six hour clock was up.

So Yan settled down and waited.

The Warrior II was parked at Xuanhuan station, and the ship was taking the time to unload what saleable cargo they had. Sylva and Kino hadn't left the ship. Keep, her captain, and the whole crew seemed amenable to waiting around for the First Star to show up. Sylva had the impression that they wanted to talk to Yan, to get in on the ground floor of whatever business dealings might result from outright challenging the Empire, as Sylva had said to Mr. Olenya.

It also seemed like Keep was reluctant to let Sylva and Kino leave and wander around Xuanhuan unattended. Sylva didn't mind this protectiveness, though it may have been simple practicality on Keep's part. Xuanhuan station was not a pleasant place, as Sylva well knew.

The Warrior II couldn't wait around forever, of course, so if Yan didn't show up in a bit, Sylva would need to make the difficult call of either staying on the station without backup to speak of, or leaving with the Warrior II. Sylva desperately hoped she wouldn't have to make that choice. If it came down to it...

She considered this prospect while sitting at her own table in the communal dining room, looking out the window at the stars that rotated past, catching the occasional lopsided glimpse of oblique parts of the station itself. She drummed her fingers on the table arhythmically.

"Mind if I sit?" Keep asked.

"Of course not."

She had her baby on her back, strapped in with one of the little carriers that spacers liked. Trav drooled onto her shoulder. Sylva made a face at him and he giggled.

"You almost ready to leave?" Keep asked.

"I've packed the tiny amount of stuff that I have, if that's what you're asking," Sylva said.

"I think you should know me well enough to know what I'm asking," Keep said.

Sylva gave a deep sigh. "I know you can't stick around forever."

"Trust me, I'd prefer to stay here until I know you're safely back on your own ship," Keep said. "But we have a business to run."

"I know. I wish there was something I could do to pay you back for all of this," Sylva said, waving her hand to indicate everything that Keep and the whole crew of the Warrior II had done for her. It seemed wholly inadequate.

"You're a pirate," Keep said. "We help our own. At least the ones we like," she added with a wink.

"Aww," Sylva said.

"But really. When it's time for us to leave, I'd love to know if you're coming with or staying behind."

Sylva bit her lip. "Could I ask you another huge favor?"

Keep squinted at that. "How huge."

"Uh, less than two meters tall."

Keep made a face. "What?"

"I think, if the First Star doesn't show soon," she began, then took a deep breath before continuing. "It would be better if I went to Xuanhuan, and you took care of Kino."

"Have you actually talked to Kino about that?"

"Kino's said about three words in the past however many days. No."

"Have you at least expressed this plan out loud in her vicinity?"

"She's smart. She should know that this is the best plan, even if we don't talk it out."

Keep pursed her lips, and Trav giggled at the face Sylva made in response. She would miss that stupid, cute baby, she thought.

"And what makes you think that this is the best plan?"

"I think we might be safer if we split up," Sylva said. "And if I stay on the station, we won't have to leave a traceable message showing where you've gone."

"I think you're great, Sylva," Keep said, "but I don't think you could stop that information from being tortured out of you."

"Hey," Sylva said. "If I get caught, that's way, way better than both me and Kino getting caught."

"You still might be safer together."

"I don't think Kino is really in a state to fight."

"You never know. People often surprise you, when they get truly desperate."

"Hmph," Sylva said. She stared out the window again.

"If that's really what you want to do," Keep said, sounding resigned, "so be it. But I do think it would be better if both of you stayed with us."

"I don't want to be that much of a burden."

"Two extra bodies won't sink the ship."

"And I want to get back to Yan as fast as possible."

"You have to face the possibility that she won't come," Keep said.

"I refuse to do that, so don't bring it up."

"It's true." Keep ignored the rancorous expression that had taken up Sylva's face. "You have to plan for that eventuality."

Sylva did her best to try to relax. "You'll be back here eventually, won't you?"

"Eventually. It probably won't be for a long time."

"I can wait until then, if I have to."

"Being a resident on a dark station isn't exactly pleasant."

"I've made up my mind," Sylva said. "You'll just have to deal with that."

"Okay, okay," Keep said. "Fine."

"Do we have any way of knowing if the First Star arrives?"

"Not unless they radio Xuanhuan," Keep said.

"So it's just a waiting game."

"Pretty much everything is."

Another ship jumped in, and Sid was alerted as soon as the gravimeters pinpointed the location. Sid was on highest alert.

When radio silence wasn't broken by the drones, Sid relaxed marginally, but when there was no second jump of the mystery ship into Xuanhuan station after the appropriate amount of time had passed, Sid began to worry.

"Did the drones get an eye on the ship?" Sid asked Captain Slater.

"They would have broken radio silence if they had identified the First Star," Slater said.

"Then why aren't the pirates jumping in?" Sid asked. "You'd think that if they're in this system to do business with the station, they'd head towards it."

"Do I look like a pirate expert, Apprentice Welslak?" Slater asked, clearly fed up with him.

Sid scowled and turned away. His presence on the bridge was grating on captain and crew alike, but he was both a ball of nervous energy, and someone they couldn't precisely turn away. It was a poor combination. Sid had forgotten how annoying the 'sit and wait' style of spacefaring could be.

"Will the drones report what ship it is?" Sid asked, again turning back towards Slater, a new thought popping into his head.

"Apprentice, I--"

"Because I'm just worried," Sid said, then realized that expressing his level of worry would involve perhaps revealing a little too much information.

"About what, Apprentice?" Slater's eyes were narrowed.

"I've known... sensitives..." Sid said, trying to find the best way to phrase this, without it sounding completely absurd. "Some are able to completely block large objects completely from sight."

"Invisibility?" Slater asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Something like that."

"And you think that the sensitive who you believe to be aboard the First Star may be doing so?"

"If we saw a ship jump in to the system, but didn't see it get any closer to the station, it could be," Sid said. "That's why I want to know if the drones will report back regardless."

"You know they will. That's how we identified the Son of Emerri."

Sid frowned, deeply. "Then why are we waiting?"

"The ship may have identified and shot down the drone that came close enough to investigate."

"And we wouldn't notice?"

"Not if we're keeping radio silence."

"If I were a pirate, I wouldn't do that," Sid said. "I wouldn't risk damaging the station owner's property."

"Then the ship could have moved under standard engine power to a different location, and our drones might be unable to find it."

"Wouldn't we have seen them light up?"

"Not necessarily."

Sid was growing frustrated. "None of this sounds plausible."

"But an entire ship being completely invisible does?" Slater asked.

"You aren't a sensitive," Sid said. "It's hard to explain."

"Try me."

"When I was at the front," Sid said, lowering his voice to the lowest it could go, just in case anyone on the bridge who was not cleared for this information was listening, "sensitives hid an entire star, completely from view. Only the gravimeter picked up the mass of an entire star system. A ship is nothing compared to that."

Slater frowned deeply. "So what do you propose."

Sid made a choice. "I want to break radio silence."

"And what will that accomplish?"

"I think I can get them to show themselves."

Slater frowned deeply. "Won't that simply encourage them to jump away?"

Sid considered this. "I think that they might want to stay."

"That's a lot to risk on thought."

"It could be a targeted broadcast," Sid said. "Directly to the location where we detected the ship jump in. It doesn't have to let the pirates know we're here."

"And if it's a pirate ship you end up broadcasting to?"

"Will it matter?" Sid asked. "They'll probably ignore it."

"Again, you're risking a lot on presumption."

"Let me try. It's better than waiting around and having them jump out."

Slater considered this. "And after you broadcast, then what?"

"We jump in," Sid said. "Once we've confirmed who it is."

"And how will you do that?"

"I think the First Star will be willing to respond, if I provoke them," Sid said. "Give me a private room and a line. I'll make it happen."

"I put too much faith in you, Apprentice," Slater said.

Yan sat on the bridge, waiting.

"Patience," she muttered to herself, but once again she was speaking to herself just to stay awake. She had no idea how long it would take for Iri and Chanam to do what they needed to do aboard the station. That wholly depended on if Sylva and Kino were there.

She wished she could distract herself with something, take her mind off that overwhelming anxiety mingled with anticipation, but keeping the ship invisible required just enough concentration that she could do nothing else but sit and wait.

She could hum songs, talk to herself, and, if she had ever been in a praying mood, pray, but little else. Even Halen, who still appeared to her on occasion, was a little too much effort to bring to mind. That, and it was dangerous to slip into that half trance world where her subconscious ruled the power, because then she could lose control in unexpected ways. She needed to focus. She was focused. She would stay awake and steady until they returned.

The radio crackled to life with a loud beep, startling Yan so much that she jumped in her seat. She hastily leaned over the console to identify the channel, and saw that it wasn't a frequency she was familiar with. It seemed unlikely to be Iri breaking radio silence. Perhaps it was the station? She played the message out loud.

"Yan," Sid said, his odd voice recognizable even over the distortion of the radio. "It's been a while."

Her hand covered her mouth, stifling a scream. She wanted to turn the radio off, but she couldn't stop listening, with mounting horror.

"I will give you this courtesy, however little courtesy you gave me. Twenty days ago, we captured one Sylva Calor and one Kino Mejia on the surface of Hanathue. If you surrender your ship immediately, Ms. Calor will be unharmed. If you do not surrender, you will be destroyed."

There was a break for a moment, as though Sid on the other end of the line were considering what to say. "I've missed you in a way, Yan," he said. "Don't be stupid and make me kill you."