I could not read her face as she processed that information. “We were only recently aware of the agent’s presence with the hostile group,” she said. I could not tell if she was lying. “Do any of the hostile individuals still present a threat?”

“No. I want to talk to my aunt.”

“The hostiles have been neutralized?”

“Yes. Let me talk to my aunt.”

“You need to stay calm, Mr. Bhattacharya,” Captain Chavannes said. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“I’ll tell my aunt,” I said. “I know you can contact her.”

The captain nodded curtly. Still, I could not read her expression. “Of course. Lieutenant, locate Councilor Bhattacharya. Please tell me what you can.”

“Have you heard from the ship called Homestead? Are they still headed here?”

“We’ve lost communication with Homestead for the moment. We are attempting to reestablish contact, but we have reason to believe they have heard our warnings and altered their plans. The vessel has been making course adjustments for some time. As of now their rear propulsion system is still firing.”

“Are they coming here? They’re not decelerating?” I asked.

“They do not appear to have begun a deceleration burn yet,” Captain Chavannes said. “The new trajectory remains undetermined as long as they are making adjustments, but the changes indicate they do not intend to approach House of Wisdom. Mr. Bhattacharya, please be assured: We are going to get you out of there. We are preparing a team to bring you home. Do you understand?”

Oh, I understood. I wanted to nod and tell her to hurry and trust that they would come, and they would listen when they did, and the rescue crew would heroically take us away. We would land in Armstrong City. We would tell our stories. We would resume our lives, our research. The quasars I was studying had burned with brilliant fire billions of years ago, and it would be easy, so easy, to once again cast my mind and my focus into that distant past again, across the darkness of space, clinging to pinpricks of light so ancient and so far away that nothing could touch them. Not memory, not pain, not fear. It would be easy.

But others would come to House of Wisdom after our rescue. They would not be able to stay away, not with what we had learned of the parasite and where it had come from. They would be careful. They would wear protective suits and work in sealed labs and follow every protocol.

I felt the squirming itch on the back of my neck again.

They might keep the laboratory a few degrees too warm. They might shatter a glass vial. Slice a finger. It might be an accident.

They might want to know what would happen.

They might believe they could limit the danger.

I wish there was another way, my mother had said.