Tasia had offered her personal robot for the performance of vital EDF duties, but EA still devoted part of her time to watching over her owner. This shift she and Tasia had been assigned together to a red-walled storage bunker to take inventory of cold-environment garments for the Martian surface. The small compy worked diligently at her side, and Tasia was comforted just by the Listener robot’s presence.

EA hummed, as if scanning. “There are no eavesdroppers. It is safe for me to speak.” The voice that came out of the compy was eerie and familiar. “Tasia, I’m so glad I found you. I have to give you some terrible news, and this was the only way I could manage it.”

It was Jess’s voice! She whirled, but only the little robot stood there playing her recorded message, reminding Tasia of a demon-possessed person speaking with a different personality.

Jess’s voice continued. “Roamer compies have special programming, Tasia, and I activated it by sending a coded signal. EA knows to engage protective measures if she is ever in danger of being captured by an enemy, and she has instructions to find a time when she can talk with you. We didn’t know if a message would get through by regular channels.”

Tasia’s mind ran through many possibilities. What would Jess ask of her? What bad news did he bring?

“Tasia… Dad is dead,” Jess said through EAs vocal speaker. “He suffered a stroke the night of Ross’s funeral, the night you ran away. He never recovered. We searched for you, but you had already gone.”

Tasia reeled. Her vision blurred with sudden, stinging tears.

Jess paused, and his voice took on a grimmer tone. “You’ve got a decision to make, and I can’t really help you out now. There’s been another attack on a Roamer skymine, just like Ross’s. The facility at Erphano was completely destroyed, all hands lost.”

Now his voice sounded poignant and beseeching. “You’ve got your own obligations and responsibilities. I understand that. But only you and I are left in the family. Our uncles are already running the water mines, as it should be. I’m helping where I can, but I need you here, little sister. Can you come home? You’ve made your point by joining the Eddies. You don’t owe the Big Goose anything.”

Tasia stiffened to hear this, because in her heart she did owe them loyalty. She had chosen to enlist in the EDF, had taken her vow of service, had trained with them. And she knew that without her, the inept recruits had little chance against the enemy. She thought of the kleebs she practiced with and how poorly they treated her… but that didn’t mean she could just desert the military forces now. Wouldn’t that prove they had been right about Tasia all along, that she was unreliable, not to be trusted?