Klaren was waiting for them, armorless this time, but still perched near a crackling fire. She held a piece of black rock in her fist and didn’t look up as they entered, busily carving the floor with more of those strange patterns that littered the tunnel to the Underground.

“The Godstars look different, from Exonia,” the droid, perched upon her thin shoulder, said for her.

Dex looked down at his own skin, covered with the constellation tattoos that represented them. When he looked up, his eyes met Klaren’s, and he was struck by just how much the woman looked like Nor.

Beautiful golden eyes and dark hair, but missing that half-secretive smile, likely buried beneath a lifetime’s worth of guilt. Dex couldn’t blame her. She’d fallen in love with the galaxy that she was once supposed to steal for her own people, and now she was paying the price for it.

Andi stepped up to the fire, her boots close to being licked by the flames.

“The Godstars gift us our power,” Klaren explained. “I may not be near them, not in the way I once was, back in Exonia. But I still worship them, and strive to uphold their ways.”

She muttered something else, running her hands across the drawings on the floor before setting down her piece of black rock. “You’ve had time to consider my offer, General.”

To Andi’s credit, she didn’t flinch at the mention of her new title. She simply stared down at Klaren with all the predatory focus of a lioness, about to consume her prey.

Or perhaps play with it before dealing the killing blow.

Havoc had done the same to him, just this morning.

“I have,” Andi said. “And yet you still haven’t told me what exactly it is that you require from me.”

“I require nothing from you but your cooperation,” Klaren said. “But the plan I have is not one you are likely to come back from.”

Andi barked out a laugh. “I’ve come back from plenty of impossible plans.”

“As I’ve heard,” Klaren acknowledged with a nod.

“Tell me about the weapons network, and what my part in shutting it down would be.”

Klaren considered this. “You’d have to manually gain control of the weapons system, using your own DNA. That was what Cyprian used to assign you as his successor in the system, was it not?”

Dex nodded. “I watched the process. He needed Andi’s handprint, too, but it wasn’t just that. I think he took a scan of her internal DNA.”

Klaren continued. “The system will know her by that signature, and will respond accordingly. There is a hub on each capital planet that controls it. My team believes the one on Arcardius is in the general’s old estate.”

“He kept everything in his office,” Andi said. “His alcohol, and his war plans.”

Dex didn’t like the sound of this.