“Moros,” said Koyich in a surprisingly conversational tone. “See if you can put a bullet through that bastard’s head.”

Kira nearly objected, but she held her tongue. If there was a chance they could kill the Seeker, it would be for the best, even though a part of her would mourn the loss of a creature so old, capable, and obviously intelligent.

“You got it, sir,” said one of the Marines in power armor. He stepped forward, lifted one arm, and—without a moment’s delay—fired.

The Seeker’s head snapped to one side. Then it slowly looked back at them with what Kira could only interpret as sheer malevolence.

“Did you hit it?” said Koyich.

“Nossir,” said Moros. “It dodged.”

“It … Marine, nail that thing with the strongest laser blast you’ve got.”

“Yessir!”

The whine of charging supercapacitors sounded within Moros’s armor, and then a BZZT! as loud as any gunshot sounded. Kira’s skin tingled from the residual electrical charge.

She saw the laser pulse with her thermal sight: a seemingly instantaneous bar of ravening force that joined Moros to the Seeker.

Only the blast didn’t touch the dark-shrouded alien. Rather, it curved around the creature’s hide and burned a fist-sized hole in the wall of the building behind.

Even at a distance, Kira would have sworn the Seeker was smiling. And a memory came to her: it was they that enforced the wishes of the Heptarchy, and they that guarded the dangerous depths of space.…

[[Lphet here: This is to no point.]] As it spoke, the Jelly started down the other side of the ridge, along with its comrades.

Lphet’s words needed no translation. Kira followed with everyone else. The knife-edge keening rang out again, and underlying it, she could hear the drumming of approaching feet.

The two Jelly ships were parked at the foot of the ridge. The globular vessels weren’t particularly large by the standards of spaceships—the Darmstadt would dwarf them in length—but sitting there on the ground, they seemed enormous: as large as the administrative building in Highstone, where she’d gotten her seed license.

A loading ramp lowered from the belly of each ship.

The Jellies divided into two groups, one heading for each ship. Tschetter paired off with Lphet and several other Jellies heading toward the left-hand vessel. “You take that one,” she said to Koyich, pointing at the ship on the right.

“Come with us!” said Kira.

Tschetter never missed a step as she shook her head. “It’s safer if we split up. Besides, I’m staying with the Jellies.”

“But—”

“There’s a chance for peace here, Navárez, and I’m not going to give up on it. Go!”

Kira would have argued further, but they were out of time. As she sprinted alongside Falconi toward the other Jelly ship, she couldn’t help but feel grudging admiration for Tschetter. Assuming the major was still in her right mind, what she was doing was incredibly brave, same as her decision to stay behind on Adra.

Kira doubted she would ever like the major, but she would never question the woman’s devotion to duty.