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were empty of anything but the need to be there, to see. To know. And then—
    Then nothing. She could not think past it at all.
    The place she ran to was near the heart of the sector. There, finally, were people: men and women sealed into space armor that sent off the signal of Consensus.
    The starwing passed through the force field with no more than a shiver and a tingle as the energy fed its strange substance, and wrapped its wings around Meru. Inside that insubstantial shield, the starwing told her deep inside her mind, far below the oblivious hum of the web, she was invisible even to Consensus’ sensors.
    That was a disturbing thought, but the message that had brought Meru here was much worse. She slipped through the cordon of the Guard. The door to the tall grey house was open, and for a priceless few instants, no one guarded it.
    It was dim inside. A lightstrip ran up the stair, shedding just enough pale green glow to guide Meru’s feet. The landings along the way were deserted, the hallways dark. They smelled of the sickness, and of something heavier and sweeter.
    That, she realized, was the smell of death. Her stomach heaved; she stumbled. There was a word in her head now, a simple word, the only word in this nightmare world: No.
    The starwing’s purr steadied her. She pulled herself upright. One more flight. One more landing. One last corridor, and a battered and broken door hanging half off its track.
    The man who stood inside was not Jian, but Meru knew him as well as she knew her mother. He was her uncle, after all.
    He saw her, which she had not expected. “Meru! What are you doing here?”
    “Vekaa,” she said, still stupid from the shock of what she had seen and smelled and sensed. “What—”
    He moved to block the doorway. “Go now,” he said. “Just go.”
    Meru would dearly have loved to do that. More than anything, she did not want to know what was in that room. But she had come all this way. Jian had called her. She had to know.
    The starwing brushed Vekaa with the edge of a wing. He snapped back as if he had been struck with an energy bolt.
    Meru wasted no time staring. She slipped past Vekaa, and stopped.
    Jian was dead. Her face was empty. So was the web where she had been. The message was gone, the last synapse fired, the mind and consciousness dissolved.
    The light was dim and Meru’s sight kept blurring, but there was no mistaking the glistening red of blood that had trickled from ears and nostrils and eyes. Her hands were clenched into fists, her knees drawn up in a knot of pain.
    Meru felt nothing at all. Not a single thing. There was so much to feel that there was no room in her for any of it.
    Vekaa’s body moved between them. This time the starwing let him be. Meru stared blankly up at him.
    He looked like Jian. They all did in the family. He was Jian’s brother; he had been the closest to her of any, except for Meru.
    Meru could see no expression in his face. His eyes were sad, maybe. It was hard to tell. He was a scientist. He had been raised and trained to be coldly clinical.
    She had been raised and trained to be a scientist, too. That was part of why she had gone so perfectly quiet inside.
    She was observing, recording. Processing. Keeping a wall between herself and the tidal wave of feeling that would, eventually, drown her.
    Her mother was dead. Something impossible, something no one could ever have planned for, had killed her.
    “People don’t get sick on this planet any more,” Meru said. “They just don’t. How did you let it happen?”
    Vekaa made no effort to defend himself. “We don’t know what it is,” he said. “We do know that it’s virulent, and powerfully contagious.”
    “She’s not even supposed to be here,” Meru said. Her walls were cracking. Her voice was trying to. “Why would she—”
    “Please,” Vekaa said. “I understand. When there’s time, I’ll listen, and mourn with you. But you have to leave this room. The Guard will take you