‘Since they can visit parts of the galaxy we ourselves couldn’t until recently, there was always the chance we might learn something from them,’ Lamoureaux continued. ‘Which is why we’ve been studying them carefully ever since we came into contact with them.’

Corso nodded. ‘And?’

‘Imagine our surprise when we stumbled across references to a “Mos Hadroch” in some research papers written just a couple of decades ago by a specialist who’s still around. The term crops up in relation to one specific Atn clade called “Eclipse-over-Moon”.’

‘So what do we know about them?’

‘Practically nothing, and the term shows up only once, and in an oblique reference at that. But the man who actually wrote the papers knows more about this particular clade-family than anyone else alive.’

Corso nodded. ‘Then we need to track him down.’

There was a look on Lamoureaux’s face as if he was trying to make up his mind whether or not to tell Corso something. ‘Already on it, and . . . I’d like your permission to get him to Ocean’s Deep as soon as possible.’

‘Granted. Who is he?’

‘His name is Ty Whitecloud, Senator.’

Corso sat stock-still for a moment, then stood up carefully. ‘No,’ he said, very simply, and turned towards the door.

‘Senator, there isn’t anyone else who knows as much about the Atn as he does.’

‘Perhaps you didn’t hear me the first time, Ted. I said no. There are other people who could—’

‘With the greatest respect, Senator, but there aren’t,’ said Stankovic. ‘It’s a pretty rarefied field.’

‘I know a little about Atn machine-languages, Yugo. I’ve even read one or two of Whitecloud’s papers. But there are others we could try.’ He thought for a moment. Anton Laroque and Sophie Sprau, for a start. They’re leaders in the field.’

Lamoureaux shook his head. ‘We checked them out already. Laroque was in Night’s End when it was destroyed, and Sprau’s extremely elderly and on life-support back on Earth. She isn’t expected to survive more than another couple of weeks. That leaves only Whitecloud.’

‘He’s a war criminal,’ Corso barked.

‘Sir?’ asked Stankovic, looking puzzled.

Stankovic was from Derinkuyu, Corso remembered then, a long way from Redstone. ‘Whitecloud is a Uchidan,’ Corso explained. ‘Or at least he worked for them. One of the bright lights of their scientific community at one time. Do you remember the Port Gabriel incident?’

Stankovic’s eyes slid to one side as he strove to recall buried memories of media reports from years before. ‘In the general details only.’

‘The Uchidans found a way to control the minds of machine-heads sent to Redstone as part of a Consortium peacekeeping force. Uchidan skull implants aren’t, after all, that fundamentally different from those of machine-heads. They identified a flaw in the machine-head architecture and exploited it. The result was a massacre that killed a huge number of non-combatants.’