There was some kindness as well. Hwa-jung brought her a cup of tea, and Vishal said, “You come see me tomorrow, yes? I will fix your nose for you.”

Falconi snorted. He had barely looked at her. “It’s going to hurt like hell if anesthetic doesn’t work on you.”

“That’s alright,” said Kira. It wasn’t, but pride and a sense of responsibility wouldn’t let her admit otherwise.

Everyone seemed exhausted, and for the most part, the galley was silent, each person lost in their own thoughts, eyes focused on overlays.

Kira had just started eating when the Entropists surprised her by sitting in front of her. They leaned in over the top of the table, eager eyes in eager faces: twins with different bodies.

“Yes?” she said.

Veera said, “Prisoner Navárez, we have discovered—”

“—the most exciting thing. As we were making our way across Malpert Station, we—”

“—came across the remains of one of the nightmares and—”

“—we succeeded in taking a tissue sample.”

Kira perked up. “Oh?”

The Entropists gripped the edge of the table together. Their fingernails whitened with the pressure. “We have spent all this time—”

“—studying the sample. What it shows—”

“Yes?” she said.

“—what it shows,” Jorrus continued, “is that the nightmares—”

“—don’t share the same genomic makeup as either—”

“—the Soft Blade or the Jellies.”

The Entropists sat back, smiling with evident delight at their discovery.

Kira put down her fork. “Are you telling me there are no similarities?”

Veera bobbed her head. “Similarities, yes, but—”

“—only similarities born of basic chemical necessity. Otherwise, the entities are entirely unalike.”

That confirmed Kira’s initial, instinctual reaction, but still, she wondered. “One of the nightmares had tentacles. I saw it. What about that?”

The Entropists nodded together, as if pleased. “Yes. In form familiar, but in substance, foreign. You may have also seen—”

“—arms and legs and eyes and fur and other—”

“—growths reminiscent of Earth-based life. But the nightmare we examined contained—”

“—no closeness to Terran DNA.”

Kira stared at the pile of soggy rations on her plate as she thought. “What are they, then?”

A paired shrug from the Entropists. “Unknown,” said Jorrus. “Their underlying biological structure appears—”

“—unformed, incomplete, contradictory—”

“—malignant.”

“Huh.… Can I see your results?”

“Of course, Prisoner.”

She looked back up at them. “Have you shared this with the Darmstadt yet?”

“We just sent over our files.”

“Good.” Akawe should know the sorts of creatures they were dealing with.

The Entropists returned to their own table, and Kira slowly continued eating as she scoured the documents they’d sent her. It amazed her the amount of data they’d been able to gather without a proper lab. The tech built into their robes was seriously impressive.

She paused when the four Marines showed up in their drab olive greens. Even out of power armor, the men were imposing. Their bodies bulged and rippled with unnatural levels of lean muscle; living anatomy charts that screamed of strength, power, and speed—their physiques the result of a whole suite of genetic tweaks the military employed in their frontline troops. Even though none of them looked like they had grown up in high-g, like Hwa-jung, Kira had no doubt they were just as strong, if not more so. They reminded her of pictures she’d seen of animals with myostatin deficiencies. Hawes, Sanchez … she didn’t know the names of the other two.