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the beads swing in his hair. "Thank you." It seemed an appropriate response and he sat back in his chair, pleased. "However, I have nothing to give you in return."
    "Oh, don't worry about that. Glitch usually does mine, she'd be outraged if I let someone else get their hands on it." He chuckled. "She spends all year making thousands of beads. Wait ‘til she has a go at yours. You'll look like a spiked Damor beast."
    "So it is not the aim to look pleasant," Lan mused, examining the artwork on the stones again.
    But Prez didn't reply; he was busy reading a message that had arrived on his personal channel. As he watched the captain, Lan felt a very odd sensation at the back of his brain, and noticed that Prez's face was going pale. Lan didn't know what that meant, but it didn't feel good. "Is everything in order?" he said.
    Prez stared at the message for another few seconds, then swung the screen around. "Read that," he said. His voice was tight.
    It was a message from Doc, containing an extract from a news article written in Andran. The translation in Common was at the bottom, underneath a photo of the Akilian Premier, evidence of the planet's problems plain for all to see in the blind woman's milky eyes and lumpy, misshapen mouth.
    Akilian Planetary Closure -- Resolution Passed
    The Planetary Government of Akilia has unanimously passed the controversial Closure resolution, which will effectively cut the planet off from all communications, signal the recall of all Ambassadors, and the cessation of all trade with the outside universe. IPF medical staff predict the extinction of the race within the next fifty years, if further attempts are not made to combat the deadly genetic plague that has afflicted the planet for the last century. Akilia has been widely condemned for its genetic experiments on non-interstellar alien races in its efforts to find a cure, but any further measures the government plans to take are unknown, and unlikely to be made public.
    An unexpected inclusion in the Resolution is sub-motion 34.A, which grants the ku-tah descendants of the aforementioned experiments full Citizen status after years of legal wranglings at the highest level. Because this group remains unaffected by the plague, the compounds have been opened and transports will be organized to remove the ku-tah from Akilia before the Closure comes into effect. There have been reports of celebrations in some of the compounds, which the Akilian government has described as "insensitive."
    The Closure will come into effect at the end of Akilia's summer cycle, two months and three days from now.
    Lan read the article quickly, and Doc's comment at the bottom -- Happy Kiz-Mah from one Citizen to another! Prez still showed no reaction, just sat there staring at the RealViewer, at the black void ahead.
    "Are you not..." Lan searched for the correct word. "Pleased?"
    Prez murmured something that Lan couldn't understand. Then he seemed to shake himself, and a sudden grin transformed his face; a big, unfettered show of white teeth and pure happiness that looked like a sun rising in the sky. He sprang out of his seat and grabbed Lan in a hug, kissing him all over his face. "Mother of skies!" he shouted in Lan's ear then released him, laughing, and sat back down abruptly, covered his face with his hands and burst into tears.
    Lan's body went rigid with panic. What was the appropriate reaction? His immediate impulse -- typically Aldorian -- was to leave, but from what he had read, Akilians were tactile, and Prez apparently even more so. Lan could feel his face tingling with the kisses it had just been covered in. Tentatively, he reached out and placed his palm on Prez's shoulder.
    "I am sorry," he said. "I do not know how to make you feel better."
    Prez wiped his eyes and sat back in his seat, his breath hitching in his chest. "Feel better?" he said. "I couldn't feel any better than this. I'm just so... huh ..." his eyes watered again, and he turned away and