The comm station was a small area with a curved ceiling, hardly big enough for even one adult humanoid. Two were already crammed inside: Leox and Affie, the former of whom was holding an amp unit to his ear. Apparently Geode was alone on the bridge, which Reath didn’t find reassuring. Master Cohmac knelt at the door, as smoothly as though that was what he’d prepared to do all along, and said, “I realize your ship has urgent communications to make, Captain Gyasi, but—”

Leox held up one hand. “Hang on.”

If Master Cohmac felt impatience, he showed no sign, merely nodded. But Reath could sense tension building within Leox and Affie—a tension that was catching. He blurted out, “What’s wrong?”

“Everything, from the sound of it.” Leox put down the amp unit and flipped a switch, projecting into the room instead.

Immediately they were inundated with noise, more than a dozen signals trying to break through at once, overlapping and blurring one another:

“—lost all power, stranded in the Bespin system, signaling any craft within—”

“—at least one thousand souls lost, possibly more—”

“—littered with the stuff, like someone mined hyperspace—”

“—can’t even begin to assess the damage until we can get through to—”

“What sector are these messages coming from?” Master Cohmac asked quietly.

Affie’s expression was grim. “All of them.”

“So many fragments of the truth,” Master Cohmac said. “No complete picture. Which of course is more frightening than the whole truth could ever be.”

“We hope,” Affie retorted.

Orla Jareni appeared in the doorway behind Reath and murmured, “Any news?”

He whispered back, “It sounds like—like this is a pretty epic disaster. Many people have already been killed.”

Killed. The word was so final, so absolute. Reath suddenly felt ashamed to have been unhappy about his frontier assignment, to have been unhappy about his future when so many beings had lost their futures entirely.

Then a new transmission came through, louder than the rest:

“All hyperspace lanes should be considered closed until further notice. For travelers beyond the boundaries of the Republic, through to the Outer Rim, we reiterate that hyperspace is currently unnavigable and extremely hazardous. All traffic is advised that hyperspace travel should be avoided at all costs.”

“Well, that’s that.” Leox shut the transmissions off. “You heard the lady. Looks like we’re sticking around here for a while.”

“Where is here?” Reath asked.

Affie replied, “Pretty much nowhere.”

They were in a near-empty corner of space, unable to either move forward or get back home. For now, and for an unknowable amount of time to come, they were stranded.

“Listen,” Leox said. “Sure, we can look at this as being marooned in deep space. But when you think about it, it’s all just space, really.”