Not exactly not in anything Id call words. It was more like taking in an expert memory dump: suddenly I know things I didnt just moments before.

Tarrant rubbed at his face and glanced at Sifra. Weve been so blind, he said.

Sifra stared back at him in stupefaction. How so?

Think about it, said Tarrant. That damn things been sailing around the galaxy all this time at sub-light speeds, but not out of choice. Once it saw the Kelvin and then us jump into this system, it was obvious to it that we had a means of travelling faster than light.

Thats got to be why it attacked the Shoal, said Megan, but not the Meridians.

Because they didnt have FTL technology? suggested Sifra.

Megan nodded. It wants a nova drive so it can get to wherever the hell it is its planning on going.

But why attack at all? said Sifra. Why not just negotiate for a nova drive in return for the information were looking for?

Imagine how dangerous it would become if it could travel at superluminal speeds, said Tarrant. That thing out there repelled the Shoal, for Gods sake. How much chance would the Three Star Alliance, or the Accord for that matter, have against it if it decided to turn on us?

So why the hell doesnt it just go and find itself a Maker cache, since thats where all the faster-than-light drives come from in the first place? said Sifra.

Its a big universe, replied Tarrant. Especially if youre stuck with traversing it at sub-light speeds. Besides, nobody knows how many more caches there are left, not after the Shoal Hegemony spent millennia destroying as many of them as it could. He shook his head. My guess is that a cache is exactly what the Wanderers been looking for all this time, but we cant afford to risk giving it what it wants until we have at least some idea what its ultimate intentions are.

Then we need to get the hell away from here, said Megan, before it decides to take our nova drive away from us whether we like it or not.

Sifra moved towards the exit.

Where the hell are you going? demanded Tarrant.

To prep the anti-matter missiles, said Sifra, stopping by the door. We can launch them into their own separate orbit. That way itll understand exactly whats going to happen if it tries to attack us.

And, for all you know, its likely to assume that were attacking it the moment we do launch them, said Tarrant. And maybe thats all the excuse itd need. We need to try and talk to it again, to see if theres something else we can use to try and get it to deal with us.

You cant put Bash through all that again, protested Megan. You saw what happened. It nearly killed him.