“We all do,” Jenner said sharply. “But we had that freedom taken from us when the enemy found us. Now, all that is left is for humanity to run. To fly between the stars and find a refuge world for a few hundred years where we can breathe for a brief sweet time before running again. I too want to live a life without fear. I want a home to go to. But there is none in this damned galaxy, not for humans. None of us have a choice anymore. So now we will join the Five Saints, and fight back. We have to. My part in this campaign is trivial. It is so small that it will never be known. But you, you and the boys—you will gather together with others like you, and you will win. You will liberate this galaxy. And humans will have a home again.”

—

Three days after they were rescued from the crash, the clan’s senior year finally moved out of their dormitory dome in the middle of the main campus complex. Genten construction remotes had built them a crescent of neat little bungalows in a fresh section of the clan compound. They all had the same basic layout of five rooms and a cohort den under a curving roof, with broad glass doors opening onto a terrace shaded by palms and vines. In the center of the crescent was a communal hall, with indoor and outdoor swimming pools and gyms and a dining room if they still wanted to eat as a group, as well as lecture theatres and design studios and all-body combat simulation eggs. There were also portals to various sites for combat exercises with live weapons and out to a skyfort for more zero-gee training.

After breakfast on the exodus day, muncs and remote wagonettes carried everyone’s belongings out of the senior dorm and across the compound to their new homes. Behind them, the new senior year swooped in on the vacated dormitories and started heated squabbles over who got which bed.

Dellian had been tempted to leave everything behind. After all, the only things in the boxes on the wagonette were relics of childhood. He considered that over now, obliterated by the resort island and subsequent ordeal on the wilderness mountain. But there were blankets the muncs were fond of, and books and old drawings that still managed to tug at a few sentimental strings deep inside. So he brought it all, telling himself he’d chuck most of it into his new home’s disposal chute. Somehow, he suspected the long line of his fellow yearmates had come to the same conclusion.