There was a pounding in my ears and that was why, I was sure, I was having such trouble understanding her. “What are you saying?”

“My team set a trap,” Tamara said calmly. “But the Ministers were taking too long to spring it. We were running out of time before the sun went nova—I was running out of time,” she clarified, only the barest flicker in her expression that might hint at grief. “The others were all dead by then. I’d set off the SOS, but the Ministers weren’t taking that bait, either. They were too cautious. I couldn’t let them be cautious. I couldn’t let them realize it was a trap. I needed them to panic and rush here, quick and unguarded.”

She took a shaky breath, and when she started to speak again, her voice was steady and measured. “I could’ve called for extraction,” she said. “But if the Ministers had seen Republican military come to this ship, they would’ve arrived guns blazing, expecting resistance, expecting a trap. Like on Kystrom. But if the Ministers saw a civilian vessel discovering this ship… they would still panic, because they couldn’t let humanity take the Philosopher Stone instead of them. But they wouldn’t send an army. They would send a full spectrum, nothing more. And they would walk in here expecting no resistance. Which is what happened.”

Indigo wasn’t reacting. Either she’d told him this already, or he’d guessed it long ago.

“I knew I could prepare a trap that could handle seven Ministers,” Tamara said, still unnaturally calm. “So I advised the Republic to send a civilian ship here.”

She’d shown up as soon as we docked the Viper on the Nameless. Tamara Gupta had climbed out of the wall and looked at us, and we’d stared at her, shocked by her unexpected appearance. By our very shock, she must’ve realized that something had gone wrong. And then she’d screamed and the others had all assumed she was crazy, so Lantern-Eyes had sat back and listened. Our conversation after she’d appeared would’ve told her everything she’d needed to know about whether the Republic had sent us there or not, and whether her cover was blown. And then Indigo had arrived, the Ministers taking the bait Tamara had dangled before them, but our ignorance had spoiled whatever trap she’d planned to spring upon their arrival. We’d wasted too much time talking, and the Ministers had gotten the jump on us, and from there everything had spiraled out of control.

The Senator was the one who had chosen me, trying to weight the scales in his favor. Probably that was why Quint had told us to kill Lantern-Eyes upon her arrival. But it was Tamara Gupta’s request that had brought me here.

Tamara was buttoning up her uniform jacket, neat and precise. I looked at Indigo, because he was the one her trap would have caught if it had been sprung correctly, and he would understand how I felt for having been a victim of Lantern-Eyes’ machinations.