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“It’s much too early to know if the way they think qualifies for our definition of ‘sensible,’ Captain,” said A’baht. “The viceroy of the Duskhan League had some very strong things to say while we were en route—some about us, some about Princess Leia, and all of it very public. You can hear for yourself—I passed that dispatch over to your queue.”

A’baht looked out at the brilliant sprawl of stars. “They knew we were coming, and they don’t want us here. Until we know just what they’re capable of, I’m not going to be happy about sitting here. We’re out in the open, and they’re somewhere in the tall grass,” he said. “You know how strategists are—no matter what their species.”

Captain Morano sighed and glanced across at his own tactical team. “It’s true—they’re easily tempted. They can’t resist trying to plan the knockout first strike,” he said, and the tactical chief confirmed the truth of it with a guilty smile. “So how do we play this?”

With a practiced ease, A’baht unstrapped his restraints and stood. “We sit here and let ’em look, because that’s what we’ve been asked to do. We move the prowlers as far forward as we dare and keep them moving along the perimeter. And we all work on being very, very watchful.”

To himself A’baht added, And then we hope the diplomats and politicians either work this out, or deal us a stronger hand—and soon. “I’ll be in my ready room, working up the entry report,” he said. “Alert me the moment there’s any change in the tactical situation.”

In the privacy of his ready room, General Etahn A’baht learned that there were not five, but six attachments to the Fleet Office’s flash update.

The sixth was an electronic hitchhiker. It had no identifying code and a length of zero. But when A’baht keyed in the code he had reluctantly and tediously memorized at Admiral Drayson’s insistence, the attachment unfolded into a lengthy dispatch from Alpha Blue.

A’baht watched the images of the Yevethan colony ships landing on Doornik-319, of the Yevethan Star Destroyers over Polneye, of the burning fields at the Kutag factory farm, of the scorched valleys on New Brigia, and wondered why the Fleet Office had withheld them from him. All the important information had been in his update—that the Yevetha had Imperial-design Star Destroyers, that multiple colonies in the Cluster had been attacked by Yevethan forces, and so on—but it had been stripped of its reality, rendered as sterile, bloodless, and calculated as the raids themselves.

The Yevetha had swept across the bright stars of Koornacht with such black ferocity that the sterile battlefields could not properly bear witness to it. Their millions of victims now had only one face, that of the only known survivor—Plat Mallar, who had seen the fire come and barely escaped it on a foolish gamble. But the Fleet Office had kept Plat Mallar’s face from A’baht as well. The reports called him simply “a Polneyan pilot,” as if afraid to let him be seen as a brave young man who had lost everything, and whose words might prick a conscience or launch a cause.

“Recorder.”

The little stenographic droid called SCM-22 trundled forward, twisting and turning within a circle twice its own diameter. “Optimizing,” it said in a high, unmistakably artificial voice. “Ready.”

“Record. Task force commander’s entry report, append,” said Etahn A’baht. “Personal to Admiral Ackbar: In my estimation, the present deployment of the Fifth Fleet is unlikely to be effective either as a deterrent to further aggression or in denying the Yevetha the benefits of their past aggression.

“Our presence at this position directly threatens no Yevetha assets and directly protects no friendly infrastructure. Nor can we effectively block a breakout with only a single Interdictor. The Yevethan fleet can go right over our head at any time, and we’d be left chasing them into the combat zone of their choosing.”

He paused to collect his thoughts, idly tapping the bridge of his nose with the blunt tips of two fingers as he did. “It is my recommendation