Jainan looked down at his work. “Don’t they?” he said quietly. “I see.”

“Surely it can’t hurt to check,” Kiem said to Aren. “Taam obviously had something going on that you didn’t know about. This could be related. Don’t you have a Systems team?”

Aren’s expression cleared. It was something of a relief working with Aren after trying to make progress with Rakal, Kiem found. Aren at least wanted to cooperate and was more concerned with finding out what was happening than perfecting an impression of a stone wall. “Better than that,” Aren said, “I have a

Systems night shift. I’ll tell them to look into it right now. But I came with a message from the palace—Kiem, they say you have a PR thing at Braska? If you need to get back, Jainan can stay as long as he likes to dig into this. We have spare quarters.”

“No, I don’t need to—” Kiem began.

“Yes,” Jainan said, looking strained. “You should. If not now, then in the morning. I don’t want to disrupt your entire schedule. The school is expecting you, and I have embroiled you in this far enough.”

Aren was looking between them curiously. Kiem, suddenly aware that they were in public, shut his mouth on a refutation. He was no judge of what was appropriate, but he could read a conversation that far, and it wasn’t as if he was much help at trawling through data. “Right,” he said. “Take your time. I’ll come back here after—or I can meet you at the palace. Whatever works. I’ll go in the morning.”

“That’s settled then,” Aren said. He gave them a wave as he turned. “I’ll alert the Systems team. Jainan, send over your findings about the hacking attempts, would you?”

Jainan turned back to his report the moment Aren left. Kiem dozed off in a chair, then unstuck his eyes and went to sort out their sleeping arrangements.

All the base offered to house guests were tiny rooms with cots the size of coffins, so Kiem took one room for himself and another for Jainan. They were hours away from the nearest journalist: Hren Halesar never had to know. He eventually had to drag Jainan away from his work to get some sleep. He tried to do the same himself, but the cot’s mattress was hard and thin, and he slipped into an uneasy doze while hazy visions of soldiers and Internal Security went through his head.

The next day, Aren pinged them both to his office before Kiem was properly awake.

Aren’s entire demeanor had changed. Before, he had given off a bright energy, as if he still hadn’t quite processed that his previous commander might have been murdered. Now, he was sober, with a pale face and dark shadows ringing his eyes from lack of sleep.

“I have had a bad night,” he greeted them. “Colonel Lunver’s on her way out here, and she isn’t happy. Apparently I shouldn’t have let you into our systems but, honestly, fuck that. I need answers.” He threw a screen up to hover above his desk. “Here’s the really bad news.”