More expedient. That didn’t sound very symbiotic to Leo. More like, you scratch my back . . . or else.

“In other words, you just came, filled up your tanks, and then left,” Baz paraphrased. “All without permission. All without giving anything in return.”

“And how do you make your living, Captain?” Lark asked.

Baz stopped in his high-topped tracks, bringing up one hand to shield his eyes from the scorching sun. “Excuse me?”

Leo watched the Aykari’s own blue eyes, waiting for the shift, the flare, but Lark maintained his composure. “You have no uniform. No insignia. No emblem. Which indicates that you are not allied with either empire, meaning you are most likely in business for yourself. Perhaps you are a trader, or even a smuggler, but judging by the armament on your ship and on your person, I think it much more likely that you are a pirate or a slaver. If either is the case, then you must be used to taking what you want without permission.”

Baz opened his mouth to protest but then just as quickly closed it. Leo thought of the bag full of pentars taken from the Darkashi vessel. The half jar of peanut butter he himself had licked clean.

Kat came to her captain’s defense. “We do what we have to do to get by because your endless war leaves us no choice.”

“It is our war now, human,” Lark said. “And there is always a choice. Yes, we could have followed a different strategy with the Orin. We could have eradicated their species before even touching down on the planet. We could have enslaved them, as I understand your species has done with its own kind throughout your history, based on something as arbitrary as the color of their skin. We could have handed them technology that they couldn’t possibly understand and left them to figure it out, no doubt causing even more problems, imbalances, inequalities. Instead we came, took what we wanted, and left, just as the consequences of those decisions were playing out.”

“What consequences?” Boo wanted to know.

Lark paused before answering. “Every planet is different. Its reaction to the extraction process varies. Some remain stable for the duration. Others begin to weaken over time. The mining process is mostly clean, but there are always side effects: the loss of flora and fauna, the introduction of new hazards into the biosphere, changes in climate, ecological imbalance, disruptions to the food chain—these are to be expected. But sometimes the planet itself seems to revolt against the process. Violently so.”

“Earthquakes,” Leo blurted before realizing that’s probably not what they would be called. Not here at least. Yet Lark seemed to be familiar with the word.

“The tectonic disturbances caused by the extraction were much worse than anticipated here. It did not help that the Orins’ construction methods were so primitive, their structures fragile and prone to collapse. This,” Lark said, indicating the ruins around them, “this was the result of the planet’s reaction. Whole villages swallowed into the ground. Thousands of lives lost. An unfortunate consequence.”