to Kai. “I’m getting a little tired of thanking you for saving us.” She gave a weak smile. “How about I just thank you in advance for any further acts of kindness?
Dash grinned. “The Cygnus Realm—saving everyone for five years or so, but complaining all the way.”
Lomas looked at Kai. “How’d you get behind him? Not that I’m not thankful, but you’re sneaky.”
“Sneaky has furtive connotations,” Kai replied. “I prefer stealthy.”
“For that matter,” Lomas went on, “it was like you two had that planned all along. When did you even get the chance?”
“Kai might be stealthy, but I was a courier, so sneaky is my default setting. Shifty, too,” Dash said, glaring down at Envaer’s still form. “In any case, Kai and I are used to working together.”
“The Messenger is not easily deceived,” Kai said.
“I’ll say,” Lomas said, then grimaced in pain. Her wound, though treated, was starting to weep through the first-aid foam slathered over the burnt hole in her insulated vest.
“We need to get you back to some decent medical care,” Dash said, but Lomas shook her head.
“Just bandage me up with this stuff,” she said, nodding at the foam. “I’ll—be fine. Let’s do what we came here to do.”
Dash watched as the icy lump of hell rock called Shatter fell away behind the Archetype. It was, he thought, an impressive amount of treachery Envaer and his co-conspirators had invested in the place. No wonder the traitor panicked when Lomas had decided to take them there.
“Dash, two ships have just translated into this system,” Sentinel said. Pertinent data flashed up on the threat board, while the tactical situation immediately updated.
Dash peered at the data, brow lifting. “Two ships, both human design and manufacture, but not ours. Rimworld League, I guess? Lomas, you seeing this?”
“No. Our scanners aren’t—oh, wait. I guess your AI is sending the data to us.” There was a brief pause. “Yes, those are ours. Two Pyro-class corvettes. But—”
“But what?”
“But without our fleet insignia.”
“Huh. Say hello to some of Envaer’s friends. Sentinel, light ’em up with the targeting scanners, as much power as you can.”
Firing solutions immediately popped up for the two unmarked League ships. A few seconds later, they burned through a hard course change and headed back for the translation point.
“Yeah, I thought so,” Dash said, giving a bleak smile. “You’ve got some housecleaning to do, Lomas.”
“So it appears. We might need your help with that.”
“Of course. Last thing we need is to be trying to fight the Deepers while there’s treachery in the ranks.”
And what treachery. The supposed historical archive contained stocks of weapons, ammunition, body armor, and other items of war. There were also data cores containing computer viruses, forged documents, and everything else needed to consolidate power after a coup d’état. They’d even found six heavily armed fighters the size of Denkillers stored in a repurposed archive vault, with a concealed hangar door built into the far side of the mountain.
Lomas, and those loyal to her, had their work cut out for them. Dash was even considering bringing Ragsdale through the Gate to help them dig out the corruption. He wasn’t kidding when he’d said to Lomas that treachery in the League was a distraction they definitely did not need right now.
Of more immediate interest, though, was what Kai had found. With careful searching, Kai located the materials that brought them all to Shatter in the first place. With Lomas’s blessing, Kai had gathered it all up and was bringing it back to the Forge, to study.
And, Dash thought, to hopefully give them some answers to their many questions—and maybe even to questions they hadn’t even yet thought to ask.
“We still have much work to do,” Kai said, gesturing at the holo display over the War Room table. “But even our initial pass through the archives has revealed two terms that seem to be prominent: Awakening, and The Path.
“I was about to say I’m not an expert in this particular data source,” Kai said, offering a self-effacing smile, “but, actually, I am, so I know critical memories when I see them written. Awakening and The Path must be references from the past we share with the people who are now the Rimworld League. I think they matter more for our future.”
“Are they references to events, or to things?” Dash asked.
Leira, who’d joined Dash to hear Kai’s initial cut at the data, crossed her arms. “Events would be better. Things tend to blow up, or get used in wars,” she said.
“They may