Come on in, whoever you are. You’re why we came.

Except that the Ark had arrived before humanity had swung down from the trees. It had to be designed to welcome whatever sprang from ancient forests, glimpsed in pixels by a species long extinct.

Staff up and coffee-strong, they prepared a team to haul alongside the Ark and board. Then the Prefect suddenly cried, “The Ythris are already there!”

Rachel glanced out a port while she slipped on her skin suit. Floating across the space between them and the Ark, lit only by starlight, were… bubbles. With her helmet on she closeupped those motes and saw that Ythri space suits were the opposite of theirs: expanded, transparent oblate spheroids with appliances socketed into the walls. A Ythri swam in the bubble, breathing air and propelling itself with tiny jets. The suit bubbles had grappling arms, and the team of six Ythri was forming a ring around the Ark cylinder. Each carried a teardrop thing of tan ceramic alongside.

“They’re not going for the front door,” she sent before sealing her suit. By the time she got out their air lock, the Ythri had the tan ceramics attached to the Ark hull, encircling it.

“What’s up?” she sent on private comm to the Prefect—who, she saw, hadn’t bothered to get into his skin suit. Maybe he didn’t bother to have one, either; he was standing at the big port in the ship’s bridge.

She glided past him on a tether, skating across the Venture’s hull in the inky dark. “We anticipated this,” he said blandly, and she could see his lips move.

“What’re they—”

“Probably mounting those simple fusor packs they’re carrying. They want to get the full implosion impact, tear the Ark down to atoms.”

“Why?”

“Some ancient grudge, I surmise. I had their ship sounded from outside, when it first came into Lunar orbit. The fusor warheads showed up clearly.” He stood with hands behind his back, a traditional Prefect stance of measured patience.

Rachel wasn’t feeling patient and would probably never be a Prefect. “You knew all this—”

“And did not tell you, yes. I could not predict how well the Ythri could read your unconscious signals.”

“What do you—”

“A moment.” The Prefect nodded to the Venture captain.

From the forward hull a concealed projector suddenly jutted forth. Its snout turned, focused, and Rachel heard a braaaack in her microwave inputs. Nothing happened that she could see, but the Prefect nodded and allowed himself a small smile.

“Their simple warheads are now dead. Go tell them.”

So she was message girl now. Still, Rachel was glad to be free of the Venture and jetting toward the floating Ythri bubbles. As she approached they seemed disturbed, working furiously at their socketed tools. The tan ceramic warheads were just lumps on the Ark’s cinder-dark skin.

“Your explosives will not work,” she sent Fraq on a narrow squirt beam.

“I have scented this,” he said tightly, gliding over the Ark’s horizon.