“If I may, what are we doing about the Urse Damay?” Coloma said. “It’s damaged, but it’s not entirely dead. It still represents a threat to both our ships.”

Sorvalh nodded to Fotew, who addressed Coloma. “The Urse Damay had missile launchers bolted on to it, holding nine missiles,” she said. “Three of them were sent at you. Three of them were sent at us. The remaining three have our weapons trained on them. If they were fired, they would be destroyed before they were launched out of their tubes. That is if the Urse Damy had enough power to target either of our ships or fire the missiles at all.”

“Have you made contact with the ship?” Coloma asked.

“We ordered its surrender and offered to rescue its crew,” Fotew said. “We have heard nothing from it since our battle. We have done nothing else pending our surrender to you.”

“If Lieutenant Wilson had accepted our surrender, then it would have been you who would have to coordinate the rescue,” Sorvalh said.

“If there were someone still alive on that ship, they would have signaled us by now,” Fotew said. “Us or you. The Urse Damay is dead, Captain.”

Coloma quieted, dissatisfied.

“How will you explain this incident?” Abumwe asked Sorvalh.

“How do you mean?” Sorvalh replied.

“I mean each of our governments have agreed that this discussion of ours is not actually taking place,” Abumwe said. “If even a discussion is not taking place, I would imagine an actual military battle will be hard to explain.”

“The military battle will not be hard to handle politically,” Sorvalh said. “The surrender, however, would have been difficult to explain away. Another reason for us to be grateful of the politic choices of your Lieutenant Wilson here.”

“If you are so grateful, then perhaps you can give us the answer we came here to get,” Abumwe said.

“What answer is that?” Sorvalh said.

“Why the Conclave is targeting and attacking Colonial Union ships,” Abumwe said.

“How very interesting,” Sorvalh said. “Because we have the very same question for you, about our ships.”

*   *   *

“There have been sixteen ships gone missing in the last year,” Colonel Abel Rigney explained to Abumwe. He and Abumwe were in the office of Colonel Liz Egan, who sat with them at her office’s conference table. “Ten of them in the last four months.”

“What do you mean by ‘gone missing’?” Abumwe asked. “Destroyed?”

“No, just gone,” Rigney said. “As in, once they skipped they were never heard from again. No black boxes, no skip drones, no communication of any sort.”

“And no debris?” Abumwe asked.

“None that we could find, and no gas clouds of highly vaporized ships, either,” Egan said. “Nothing but space.”

Abumwe turned her attention back to Rigney. “These were Colonial Defense Forces ships?”