My emotions were deep and unwelcome. I’d never met that woman, but her loss was visceral. It was as if, against my will, I had become part of this little community, as we huddled together on the roof of that crudely built hospital. Not to mention the fact that I now wouldn’t be able to fulfil my orders completely.

I prepared to plunge back into the flow.

Tilo grabbed my arm. ‘No. Not yet. You are exhausted. Anyhow you have a call to make, remember? If you can get me a data desk—’

Lian spoke up. ‘Sir. Let me bring in the stranded locals.’ She said awkwardly, ‘I can manage that much.’

Redemption time for this young marine. ‘Don’t kill yourself,’ I told her.

With a grin she slid off the roof.

Briskly, I used my suit’s comms system to set up a fresh link to the Spline. I requested another pickup - was told it was impossible - and asked for Kard.

Tilo requested a Virtual data desk. He fell on it as soon as it appeared. His relief couldn’t have been greater, as if the mud didn’t exist.

When they grasped the situation I had gotten us all into, Admiral Kard and Commissary Xera both sent down Virtual avatars. The two of them hovered over our wooden roof, clean of the mud, gleaming like gods among people made of clay.

Kard glared at me. ‘This is a mess, Lieutenant.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘You should have gotten Tilo over that damn bridge while you could. We’re heavily constrained by the Xeelee operations. You realise we probably won’t be able to get you out of here alive.’

It struck me as somewhat ironic that in the middle of a Galaxy-spanning military crisis I was to be killed by mud. But I had made my choice. ‘So I understand.’

‘But, Kard,’ Xera said, her thin face fringed by blocky pixels, ‘he has completed his primary mission, which is to deliver Tilo’s data back to us.’

Kard closed his Eyes, and his image flickered; I imagined Tilo’s data and interpretations pouring into the processors which sustained this semi-autonomous Virtual image, tightly integrated with Kard’s original sensorium. Kard said, ‘Your report needs redrafting, Tilo. Sharpening up. There’s too much about this dark matter crud, Academician.’

Xera said gently, ‘You were here on assignment from your masters in the Navy, with a specific purpose. They wanted to know what the Xeelee are up to. But it’s hard to close your eyes to the clamouring truth, isn’t it, Academician?’

Tilo sighed, his face mud-covered.

‘We must discuss this,’ Kard snapped. ‘All of us, right now. We have a decision to make, a recommendation to pass up the line - and we need to assess what Tilo has to tell us, in case we can’t retrieve him.’