“The compound mind may have military secrets that we can’t afford to lose,” the general said. “It’s impossible for us to know what they might have discovered in an entire planet of data. But now we know this was the Rix plan all along: first the assault ship to seed the mind, then the battlecruiser to make contact.”

The council chamber stirred again, frustration and anger filling the room. They felt trapped, powerless before the well-laid plans of the Rix.

“But perhaps we can solve both our problems with one stroke,” the Emperor said. He pointed into the airscreen among them.

Time sped forward in the display. The Rix ship’s vector marker inched toward Legis XV, from which another marker in Imperial blue moved to meet it.

“The Lynx,” Nara said quietly.

“Correct, Senator,” the Emperor said.

“With aggressive tactics, even a frigate should be able to damage a Rix battlecruiser. Especially the receiver array,” the admiral said. “It’s too large to shield properly, highly vulnerable to kinetic weapons. Between battle damage and a careful, systematic degradation of the Legis communication infostructure, we may be able to keep the compound mind cut off.”

“Any casualty estimates for this plan, Admiral?” Oxham asked softly.

“Yes, Senator. On the planet, we’ll airjam com systems and flood the infostructure with garbage. Shunt the main hardlines for a few days to reduce bandwidth. Civilian deaths will be within normal statistical variation for a bad solar storm. Medical emergency response will be slowed, so a few dozen heart-attack and accident victims will die. With lowered transponder functions, there may be a few aircraft accidents.”

“And the Lynx?”

“Lost, of course, and its captain with it. A grand sacrifice.”

Henders nodded. “How poetic. Granted Imperial pardon, only to become a martyr nonetheless.”

“The trees will burn for a week in the name of Laurent Zai,” the Emperor said.

Adept

The two dead persons stood before a wreckage, the broken and burned shapes of data bricks scattered across the floor of the library.

“Was it here?”

“Yes, Adept.”

“Did the Rix abomination find it?”

“We don’t know, Adept.”

“How can we not know?” Trevim said quietly.

The initiate shifted uncomfortably. He looked nervously at the walls, although every noise-sensitive device in the library had been physically deactivated.

“The abomination cannot hear us.”

The initiate cleared his throat. “The one-time pad was concealed as a set of checksum garbage at the ends of other files. Only the few Honored Mothers studying the Child Empress’s…condition knew how the scheme worked. There was no way for the abomination to know how to compile the data and re-create the pads.”

Adept Trevim narrowed her eyes.

“Could it not use trial and error?”

“Adept, there are millions of files here. The combinations are—”

“Not limitless. Not if all the data were here.”

“But it would take centuries, Adept.”