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slowly, wishing he could disappear.
    “Then sit down and shut up.”
    Cautiously, he settled to the floor. It had a soft white carpet. As his legs folded under him, he sensed a hint of anger from the boy at the window. Lot glanced at him, and the boy extended a slight nod toward the adults, while a brief expression of contempt flashed across his face. Pointless , the boy seemed to say. Arguing with them was pointless.
    Lot wondered.
    Kona observed this exchange. He’d changed out of his coverall, into a soft felt vest and loose slacks. His sharp eyes lingered on Lot, as cool as twin scientific instruments designed to assay the quality of human intent. Lot eyed him warily, wondering if he had ordered the psychoactive virus to be released.
    On the muted projection wall Yulyssa’s faint image was gone, replaced by a dark field, featureless but for a poorly resolved image glowing dully red. The red deepened into the outline of a great ship, its extended cooling fins arranged in a pattern both distinct and familiar. “ Nesseleth ,” Lot whispered.
    Kona followed his gaze curiously, then scowled. “Why is Yulyssa playing that again? Haven’t we seen it enough?”
    Nobody answered.
    Lot’s fingers dug into the carpet as Nesseleth’s image dwindled in size. He saw the lowest fin flare to white, then vanish. He thought he saw the side fins crumple too, but he couldn’t be sure. She’d become only a faint red blur on the dark wall, and suddenly that was gone too as incandescent white sheathed her entire hull in a brief flash that lasted less than a second, before she vanished completely.
    “It was a mistake,” Captain Antigua said, in that awful, hollow voice. “We would leave, but our ship is gone. We must find another way.”
    “There is no other way.” Kona leaned forward, his braids shifting slightly, a slow tide. “Unlike you, Captain Antigua, we did not come to Silk by choice. We were abandoned here, left to die. But we didn’t die. And we won’t let you die either. You and your people.”
    Lot hunched against the poisonous scent of Captain Antigua’s fury. “These people are not my people, Kona Lukamosch. They are from many worlds. They were brought together by Jupiter, and without him, they are nothing at all.”
    Lot flinched. That wasn’t true. They were one people. Jupiter had made them into one. He wanted to shout it, but he couldn’t form the foreign words through his stunned surprise.
    Kona Lukamosch didn’t seem pleased with her answer either. “They are your people now, Captain. You are the only surviving officer. You are the closest thing to a leader they have left.”
    Lot felt his heart catch. The only surviving officer?
    “They won’t listen to me,” Captain Antigua insisted.
    Mama had been an officer. Lot felt a flurry of emptiness swirl around him, as if the darkness in the muted projection wall had slipped out to flood the room.
    “You will make them listen, Captain Antigua. That is your assignment. That is the price of your freedom. If you ever want to be more than a ward of this government, than you will make them listen.”
    A little choking sound escaped Lot’s throat. Jupiter was gone and Mama was dead and Captain Antigua despised their people. He could see that now. What he’d taken for fury was really hate, and maybe she’d already betrayed the army and maybe that’s why Mama was dead. She didn’t deserve to receive the faith of Jupiter’s army. She didn’t deserve it, the lying, lying, dirty coward.
    He rose quickly to his knees. “You don’t need her!” he said in his own birth language. Kona looked at him in mild irritation, while Lot searched for the right words in the language the Silkens used. “You don’t need her,” he repeated. “Let me do it. Let me talk to the army. They’ll listen to me. They will.” His accent was bad. The words came out with soft edges, but Kona understood him.
    “That may be true, young man. But if it is, it’s more a problem