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“You’ve gotten mighty pale, son. Do you need- “

“It’s nothing,” Toh said quickly. “Or, rather, it is something, but it’s not you.” He got up from his chair. “I’ve got to get back to the office. Sorry. Talk to you later!”

Toh didn’t hear what Joseph said as he ran out the door toward the nearest transporter station.

Within twenty minutes-there was a line at the station, and his government ID didn’t do anything to expedite matters, which rather annoyed him-he was back in his office. The first thing he did was contact Rol Yarvik Rol, who was working late on a project for Fred.

“Whatever you need, Toh, can it wait? Fred is- “

“Just a quick question, Yarvik. You’ve read over all of Artrin’s decisions, right?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Was there a decision on 5 Torus Fortil?”

“There aren’t any decisions in Torus, that’s when they’re in- “

Toh snarled. “I know that, I mean an emergency session.”

“Artrin didn’t preside over any emergency sessions.”

“You sure?” Toh had been afraid Yarvik would say the very words he was saying now.

“Completely sure. Why?”

“Nothing.” This was too big for a researcher. This is too big for me, he thought. “Is Fred still in his office?”

“He’s with Ashante down at that cafe they like. He said he’d be back in an hour.”

“Okay, thanks.” Toh cut off the connection, took a moment to pray to the Prophets for guidance, then put a call through to Fred. He’s gonna hate being interrupted like this, but he’s with Ashante, and that’ll save some time. And better to tell them sooner than later, especially if the council already has this.

The last time Esperanza Piniero felt this ragged was after the U.S.S. Gorkon was told to hold the Delavi system for three weeks during the Dominion War. They were at red alert the entire time, and by the end of the second week, Esperanza felt like she had run six marathons in the space of two hours. Her muscles ached, her mouth tasted like engine coolant, and a phaser drill was on overload behind her right eye.

Four months in the Palais gave her a tremendous sense of deja vu for those days in the Delavi system.

Still, another day seemed to finally be at an end. The president’s speech on Titan had gone well. The shipbuilder’s guild seemed mollified about Aligar-though they were expressing concern about the Rigel colonies following the directive to change over their warp drives.

She opened an intercom channel to her assistant. “Please, Zachary, by all that is holy on thirty worlds, tell me that we’re done for the day.”

Her office door slid open to reveal Zachary holding a padd. “Not quite. Sorry, this just came in from the travel office.” He walked it over to her at her desk.

“Let me guess,” Esperanza said as she took it. “They felt bad for not having screwed anything up in a few months?”

“Sort of. They had to change the president’s itinerary for the goodwill trip.”

Esperanza glowered at Zachary. “We spent six weeks hammering out the details of the trip. It was vetted by half the people in this building. What could they possibly want to change now?”

Zachary smiled. “It’s kind of funny, actually.”

At Esperanza’s look, his smile fell. “Right now, Zachary, you could get the entire Luna-See Troupe up here and have them perform their whole repetoire from Again, the Ears to Zakdorn’s Sun Is Going Nova Tomorrow, and it wouldn’t be funny.”

“Okay, well, in any case, it turns out that the original itinerary had one problem-we would be arriving on Lembatta Prime on the day before an eclipse.”

The phaser drill now moved to her left eye. “What, they don’t have lights on Lembatta?”

“Oh, they have lights, but, uh- ” Zachary took a breath. “Whenever there’s an eclipse, and also the day before and after, it’s a major religious holiday. Essential work is still done, but anyone not actually doing that is obligated to stay at home and meditate.”

Esperanza leaned her head back and looked to the ceiling in supplication. To her annoyance, the ceiling was wholly bereft of aid or comfort.

She looked back at her assistant. “So if we hold