THE LIBRARIAN RESTS with her recovery team for the first moment in two months. She has invited Catalog to accompany her, assuming rightly that I am the most secure repository of her activities, and the least likely to be corrupted should a political crisis shake up the New Council—which is distinctly possible, given the scale of Forerunner losses. Most communications within the ecumene, including the Juridical network, have been temporarily blocked pending identification of the extent to which Flood-contaminated ships and systems are capable of listening in.

The Librarian’s core team—the same Lifeworker team that accompanied her centuries before to the Path Kethona—gathers after processing their most recent acquisitions. The vessels in her research flotilla are now at full capacity, both for live specimens and genetic samplings.

The Librarian appears exhausted. She is calm, quiet, listening to the team reports but saying little. She has removed her armor and is surrounded by flowing undergarments, while the armor undergoes self-repair and replenishment. The Librarian has worn the same armor for over a thousand years and exhibits an unusual attachment—for a Lifeworker—to her ancilla. But then, everything else familiar to her is either lost or far away—her children, her husband, and now her husband’s duplicate, whom she never refers to as other than “my Didact.” Even with all of these comings and goings, the reports of her subordinates, briefings from her flotilla commandant—all of her manifold, minute-by-minute duties and distractions—the Lifeshaper seems terribly alone.

It has been four years since the IsoDidact left the Erde-Tyrene system to assume command of Orion complex Defense Operations, leading forces reconstituted from both former Warrior-Servants and Builder Security.

Eventually, as her ship begins its journey to the greater Ark, the work passes behind her. Her quarters empty.

I alone am left to listen.

“Do you have any cheerful stories in your inventory?” she asks softly.

A great transparent panel spreads wide, so that we are able to see the last of the Lifeworker ships gleaming in fading starlight, anticipating the beautiful, awesome show that is portal-formation, a few minutes or hours before the commandant is reassured of transit and we begin our journey away from this system.

“There are many cases long resolved that are part of public record,” I say. “Few of which I gathered myself, however. Some are, I suppose, amusing—but what entertains Juridicals may not entertain such as you.”

“You are young in your calling?”

“I am, Lifeshaper. I have not served the requisite centuries.”

“Interesting that those not so young should entrust you with my deposition.”

“Older Juridical units tend to be more cynical, less pleasant to deal with,” I explain. “Most remove themselves from gathering evidence and serve in other capacities.”

“Perhaps they have seen too much folly. Do you appreciate all the classic forms of folly, Catalog?” she asks.

“Training in law requires an appreciation for all the ways in which we make mistakes, Lifeshaper.”