“Open a channel to Camrose,” I told the Dog.

* * *

Ambassador Odom had left his jacket off, the top button of his shirt was undone, and the corners of his eyelids drooped like the leaves of a neglected houseplant. Glowing numerals in the corner of the screen informed me that local time on the station was a little after midnight.

Briefly, I told him about the warning message the Dog had received, the events at Northfield, and Ashton Childe’s futile attempt to hijack the ship.

As I talked, the ambassador’s expression grew more and more concerned. When I had finished, he puffed his cheeks and made a face. “And here was I thinking you’d called to complain about Preston.”

I felt my face flush. “You knew he wasn’t qualified?” By supplying me with a useless medic, had he been trying to set me up? Was this his way of finally getting rid of me?

The old man cleared his throat. “I had an inkling.”

“Then, why—?”

“A favour to his father.” Odom waved a gnarled hand. “But you have more pressing concerns.”

I raised an eyebrow, surprised by the ease and speed of his admission. “Indeed we do. How do you think we should proceed?”

“With great caution.”

“Do we have your permission to tool up?”

The ambassador gave a series of rapid blinks. He opened and shut his mouth a few times. “The Trouble Dog is a decommissioned warship.”

“But if we’re walking into a trap…”

He harrumphed. “All right,” he said after a moment’s thought. “You have my permission for the Trouble Dog to start the manufacture of replacement weaponry. But please, for the love of God, try not to do anything precipitous. The Gallery’s a powder keg. One wrong move and you could start a war.”

“Or stop one.”

He looked pained. “Just come home safely.”

* * *

After the call ended, I remained in the control couch and watched the external screens. The peripheral ones showed various views of the Trouble Dog’s hull against the formless misty void of the higher dimensions. The main one showed an impossible computer-generated image of the stars, as if we were travelling through the regular universe at the same speed we were currently barrelling through the hypervoid. The slowly moving points of light were hypnotic. Seeing them shift position in relation to each other gave the sky a three-dimensional aspect you just didn’t get at any other time. Instead of points of light arrayed in the darkness like sequins on a velvet curtain, their movements relative to each other spoke of unfathomable depth and distance, especially when I pictured the impalpably tiny planets wheeling around each one like mosquitoes wheeling around a ship’s lantern on a dark and endless sea.

The Trouble Dog’s face appeared in a corner of the screen, her features superimposed on the shifting starscape.

“Any further transmissions?” I asked her.

“None at this time.”