“And she was there on Bronkal, eliminating any evidence of Baptiste snatching low-visibility people—for no reason we could ever find,” Yuri said. “Which is an even stronger association to what’s going down here, now that we know Soćko was shipped directly from there to the ship.”

“Nobody on Akitha could figure out the motivation for what Cancer was doing,” Kandara said thoughtfully. “We all thought some kind of political fanatic was employing her to sabotage their industrial systems, but this…aliens scouting around the human race…I hate to say it, but this makes a kind of sense.”

“Who the fuck are they,” Alik snarled, “and how long have they been watching us?”

“Ask the Olyix,” Loi said. “They’re clearly complicit. Maybe it’s them.”

I let out a wearisome breath. “Not this again,” I said in exasperation.

Callum gave me a sharp stare. “They lied to Yuri about Horatio Seymore. They knew he’d been snatched,” he said. “They were involved. What more do you need?”

Which was an interesting outburst. Someone—some group—had to be pushing both Ainsley and the grade-one Utopials into believing the Olyix were chasing a hidden agenda, fueling the insecurities and paranoia of the old and powerful who inevitably see change as danger. And the only people with a reason to do that are the other aliens, trying to deflect attention from themselves. Aliens with influential agents in both Utopial and Universal ruling political classes.

“There was something odd about that,” I agreed. “Maybe they employ corporate intelligence gathering companies to keep a closer look on things than we realized. I don’t know. But face it, Ainsley Zangari’s exposed granddaughter calling him in a panic is going to be noticed by someone. It may be Hai-3 was being a little too helpful and cooperative just to keep Zangari sweet. He is the richest, most powerful individual alive, and it would pay politically to keep him sympathetic. And I’m certain this ship we’ve found can’t be theirs. The Salvation of Life is a slower-than-light arkship; the Olyix don’t have wormholes. Loi, you said the power level a wormhole needs is beyond anything we produce in the Sol system.”

“Yeah,” he agreed almost grudgingly. “That’s right.”

“So it’s not them,” I said.

“You seem very certain,” Kandara said.

I gave Yuri a quick glance. He nodded permission. It didn’t go unnoticed. “It goes like this,” I said. “Ainsley has been suspicious about the Olyix since before Horatio was snatched. He never quite believed their claim to be peaceful religious fanatics.”

“Now that has truly got to be the universe’s biggest oxymoron,” Alik mocked

“Whatever they are, they’re not actively hostile to humans,” I said.

“You can’t claim that,” Eldlund said. “There’s a lot of evidence piling up against them.”