“I suppose that would explain why the Ktoran’s human collaborators were largely unaware of these activities. You are to be congratulated on your talent for deception. We were too often taken in by your ruses and decoys. But the loss of your fleet near Jupiter: there were no decoys there.”
Riordan nodded. “There couldn’t be. We knew you’d have ample time to conduct post-action forensics once you were in our home system, so there, everything had to be authentic. So we accepted those losses in advance, and figured that the fight-to-the-finish you got at Jupiter would further convince you that our desperation was absolute. And if you picked up any survivors of those craft, that was exactly what they believed.”
Darzhee Kut bobbed, but there was one thing that still mystified him—had mystified all of his rock-siblings. “These notes ring true and obvious, now that we see how they were sounded, and why. But I am still perplexed: how did your relief fleet know to come to Earth when it did, and how did it arrive so quickly? I remember that you had one shift-carrier—the Tankyū-sha Maru—accelerating to preshift velocities when we arrived in the system. But it only shifted out less than an hour before your whole fleet shifted in to counterattack us in cislunar space. How is that possible? Our intelligence on your shift capabilities is not in error. It takes at least thirty-two days for you to build up sufficient kinetic energy to initiate your shift. How did your counterattacking fleet do it in mere minutes?”
The human smiled. “It didn’t have to build up the kinetic energy. The fleet was already traveling at preshift velocity.”
Darzhee Kut saw the answer—so simple, so elegant—with great suddenness. It was as though he had been deaf, but now regained his hearing from this clap of revelatory thunder. “Roof rock. Now I see it. Your ships were all preaccelerated. They were merely awaiting the word to return to your home system.”
“Just so. We used the same strategy to cut other key communication intervals down to minutes or hours. For instance, when you arrived in Barnard’s Star, you may remember detecting a shift-vessel almost fully preaccelerated, in the far outer system?”
“Yes, of course. The Prometheus, I believe.”
“Correct. And when it shifted, it went straight to Ross 154.”
“Which we sent part of our fleet to interdict.”
“As we would have, in your place. But that’s why there was already another preaccelerated shift carrier waiting in Ross 154.”
“And the ship from Ross 154?”
“It hopped to the system we designate as Lalande 21185, which is where we had stashed all the ships and crews you thought you destroyed at Barnard’s Star. That unit—Relief Task Force One—immediately began to load all ordnance and units, and secure for pre-shift acceleration. That was on November 26. They attained preshift velocity on New Year’s Day, and then they waited.”
Darzhee Kut bobbed. “They waited for the Tankyū-sha Maru, the shift-carrier that jumped out from your home system on the day of their attack. Which must have had a time-based estimate of where your fleet was in Lalande 21185. And so it was able to deliver the message swiftly.”
“Correct. And when Relief Task Force One arrived near Earth, that started the clock ticking for all the surprises we sprung on you on Java.”
Darzhee Kut considered. “Even without the Dornaani device in your arm, you might have won.”
Caine shrugged again. “Possibly. But it would have been a much, much costlier battle.”
“True. Caine Riordan, I must ask. How many of my rock-siblings in space had their songs stilled by the Final—by their own claws?”
The human seemed to study him closely. “Less than a dozen of your major ships refrained from destroying themselves after the surrender.”
“Which your people no doubt saw as treachery, as a ploy to lure your boarding teams to their deaths.”
“Yes, it seemed that way.”
“Did they not understand that it was not our intent to destroy your people? That, because your computer virus paralyzed our ships, we had no way to scuttle them until after your soldiers had commandeered them?”
“Some knowledgeable—and calm—people concede that your actions may not have been intended to harm us. But even they do not understand why all the Arat Kur would be so determined to kill themselves.”
“But you do.”
“I might.”
“You must! You heard our discussions in the headquarters, the careless talk. You know that we remember your race, and what it did, even if your own people do not.”
“Darzhee Kut, in the epoch during which you claim your race was destroyed, the people of Earth had not yet even learned to navigate the oceans of our planet.”
“Then it may not have been humans from Earth, but descendants of populations taken from there in earlier times. But what does it matter which star the ravagers of my planet were born beneath? Their blood is your blood.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“How can I not? I have seen the pictures painted in the deepest refuge-caves. There is no mistaking the shape of your species depicted as our destroyers, more than fifteen thousand of your years ago.” He stilled his claws. “And now you are back among the stars. But enough of the past. What has happened since you defeated the forces we brought to your home system?”
“The smaller fleet you sent to Ross 154 destroyed our military facilities there, and then withdrew after deploying a Hkh’Rkh shift-carrier for raiding down the Big Green Main. Meanwhile, the Slaasriithi stepped up pressure along your common border, putting you on the defensive.”
Darzhee Kut couldn’t decide whether he should be amused or annoyed at the human’s claims. “And how would you know all this? You speak of places more than a dozen shifts distant from your homeworld.”
The human stared. “The Custodians have been most helpful with intelligence.”
Darzhee Kut felt a small, coiling worm-twist in his abdomen. “The Custodians are to remain neutral.”
“Unless the Twenty-first Accord is violated. Which you did. And the Dornaani are too busy to correct all the recent abuses to the Accords on their own.”
“So you have been deputized by the Custodians?”
“That isn’t possible, since we were never confirmed as members of the Accord.”
The abdominal squirm doubled. “Then you are operating without constraint?”
“We are, but that would ultimately be your doing, wouldn’t it? We tried—very hard—to convince you that we should be made members of the Accord. You refused.”
Darzhee Kut let his limbs slump. “When the truth is sung clearly, there are no counterpoints with which it may be confounded. It is as you say: we are the architects of our own problems.”
“I am glad you see it that way, Darzhee Kut. And I am hoping that you can convince your leaders to see the current situation similarly.”
“Why? Are we to journeying to meet representatives of the Homenest? And you wish my assistance?”
“That is correct.”
“I am flattered, but, in truth, you do not need me. The Homenest’s leaders have adequate translation devices and they will listen to your words.”
“They have not done so thus far.”
Darzhee Kut felt the wormlike sensation move up higher, into his second stomach. “You speak as though you are already in contact with them.”
“We are.”
The worm twitched its tail as he asked the next, inevitable question, suddenly dreading the answer, on the verge of vertigo, the universe suddenly adrift and unsteady. “Where are we?”