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Kel, and Rahal troops.
    She was beginning to wonder if she should leave her apologies and try again later when the terminal’s signifier shattered and showed her her own face: the same neat dark hair, the same dark eyes. But the smile was not her own, and the stranger wore a high general’s flared wings and flame where Cheris had a captain’s talon with its pricked bead of blood.
    “Captain,” the stranger said. It even had her voice. “This is Composite Subcommand Two of Kel Command. Acknowledge.”
    Cheris started to sweat. The composites changed from task to task. There was no telling which high general she was dealing with, or how many had wired their minds together into a greater intelligence. But the designation Two indicated that at least one of the highest generals was in the composite. A bad sign. She made the correct salute, not too fast and not too slow.
    “Now you understand,” Subcommand Two said, as though dropping back into a conversation they had left off last night over glasses of wine, “that your assignment was a terrible one. Frankly, it’s a waste of good officers.”
    “I know my oath, sir,” Cheris said cautiously, but not too cautiously. The Kel didn’t favor caution, something her instructors had reminded her of time and again.
    Subcommand Two ignored her, which was the best response she could have hoped for. “This is the context you weren’t given when you were sent down to Dredge. You figured out that the Eels built a weapon that took advantage of calendrical rot in order to function. Don’t deny it. Your actions against the heretics indicate your understanding of the situation.”
    Cheris said, as steadily as she could, “I am prepared to be outprocessed.” It was not a fate any Kel wanted. She had not come from a family with a tradition of Kel service – any faction service. Despite her parents’ opposition, she had survived the tests and been admitted to Kel Academy Prime. She had honed her life for service, and it was bitter to have it terminated. Still, it was a fitting fate for a Kel: the bright upward trajectory, the sudden death.
    Many people knew the ashhawk by its other name: suicide hawk.
    Subcommand Two said, “Most of your soldiers will have to be processed by Doctrine, true. But it would be a waste of your improvisational abilities to send you with them.”
    Cheris recognized a euphemism as well as the next Kel. They had something worse in mind for her, and they were going to split up her command. Still, she felt a wary relief. They wouldn’t bother briefing her unless they had some challenge in mind, and there were few wholly impossible challenges.
    “The truth of the situation is worse than a handful of Eels in peripheral systems,” Subcommand Two said. “Calendrical rot has taken hold not only in Dredge but in several central marches of the hexarchate. It cannot be allowed to persist.”
    “Sir,” Cheris said, “is this a task for a Kel rather than a Shuos?” The Rahal concerned themselves with Doctrine and justice, but they rarely dealt with full-fledged uprisings; the Vidona cleaned up the aftermath, although no one trusted them to put heresies down at the outset. The Shuos and the Kel were collectively regarded as the hexarchate’s sword, but the Kel specialized in kinetic operations and short-term goals while the Shuos pursued information operations and long-term plans. No Kel liked fox games, but there was a place and time for every method.
    For a moment the reflection wavered, and she saw amber staring out from the golden wings: a ninefox’s knowing eye. Then Cheris knew that the composite included a Shuos, probably an envoy from the Shuos hexarch himself. Her dismay was immediate. Kel Command wouldn’t consent to intimate Shuos oversight for anything less than a crisis.
    “I’m listening, sir,” Cheris said.
    “We have six officers competing to deal with the heresy in the Fortress of Scattered Needles and its surrounds,” the composite