"Yeah. At first it was just weird because it was a statue of my mother, and I was six and that felt pretty strange. But then I learned the history and…" Kira shook her head. "It's one more thing I never could have done, never could do."

"Why do you say that?" Jason looked from Kira to the statue. "She looked a lot like you do now."

"Yeah. Looks. That's not the same as what's inside."

He didn't answer for a moment. "Isn't what's inside you the daughter's blood?"

She flinched as the question poked at too-familiar feelings of inadequacy. "So what?"

"If it can make this wall so strong—"

"That's just superstition, Jason! You of all people should know better!" She turned away, telling herself that her anger was fully justified. "We need to get moving."

He followed, not saying anything. On the way down the stairs, Kira's anger cooled enough for her to feel remorse over her treatment of Jason. "Mother got the Confederation to add something besides her statue. I'll show you when we get down on the street again."

She hurried them through the large tunnel formed by the passage through the wall to the gate on the other side, which stood open and unguarded in this time of peace. Once outside again, in the cleared area in front of the fortification, Kira turned and gestured toward the wall. "See? All those names, going along the wall and up it? They're the men and women who died defending the city. It took years to chisel them all." Looking at those many names made her own concerns seem very small, but also reinforced her resolve to ensure the drive that Jason protected did not fall back into the hands of Jason's mother and the others in the ship from Urth.

Jason gently ran his fingertips across some of the lowest names engraved in the stones of the wall. "That's a lot. I've seen memorials like this in other places. There's a big one on Mars to mark the first colony collapse. This kind of thing really brings home the human cost."

Kira pointed to the right and up. "You can't see it when it's this dark, but one of those names is Sergeant Kira of Dorcastle. It's up there. I'm named for her."

"So you're kind of a memorial, too?"

"I guess. For a long time all I knew was that she had died in the siege fighting next to my mother. Mother couldn't talk about it. I just finally learned a little more about Sergeant Kira." Kira paused, thinking. "It's funny, I've spent most of my life knowing I could never measure up to my mother. But I also have Sergeant Kira to measure up to. And I don't mind that. I hope I do her name proud." Something occurred to her for the first time. "Who are you named after?"