Lanis can hear rain begin to fall against the windows of Mirem's apartment, lightly at first, and then in sweeping lashes, as Mirem shoves clothing into Lanis’ battered duffel bag. Lanis watches her, hands interlaced behind her head, trying to calm her breathing. It’s as if the effect of Peter’s words was a blast charge on a delay timer, and is only now beginning to detonate her world. This can’t be happening, she thinks, breathing through her nose, out through her mouth. She begins muttering a navigation mantra under her breath, this one a prayer in classical Arabic.

  Mirem stands, pushing the duffel bag into Lanis’ hands.

  “Let’s go, the shuttle is here,” Mirem says, hoisting her own bag over her shoulder. She’s halfway to the door when she notices that Lanis hasn’t moved from the hallway outside her bedroom. She turns to see Lanis rooted to her spot, gaze unfocused, mouthing strange words. She has her duffel bag hugged against her chest like it’s some piece of flotsam at sea, the only thing keeping her from drowning.

  “Lanis. Lanis,” Mirem says again, more urgently now, moving back to where she stands. “You heard what Peter said: Kaisho is coming here, tonight. We need to move, now.”

  Lanis doesn’t respond. Mirem moves directly in front of Lanis, trying to meet her eyes, and grips her shoulders.

  “Lanis, look at me. Look at me! We’ll be safe at the Versk Hangar. Dammit Lanis, I don’t know what’s happening, but I’m carrying you to that shuttle if I have to.”

  Mirem appears to be about to follow through on her threat when Lanis’ whispering suddenly stops. She clenches her eyes shut, and when she opens them, her eyes have refocused.

  “Ok. I’m ok. Let’s go,” she says, her voice firm. They move.

  The lobby to Mirem’s apartment complex is empty at this time of night, but the outside street isn’t. Lanis imagines some deeper shadow, waiting to pounce in every passerby’s wet, neon-lit face as they walk quickly through the foyer, out the complex’s heavy double doors, and into the wet night to where the ground shuttle waits like some slick black beetle. Mirem has her arm under Lanis’, ready to pull her along and shove her inside if the need arises. Instead, she merely guides Lanis into the shuttle’s back seat, following quickly behind.

  The shuttle begins to gently accelerate through the wet streets, and Mirem turns to Lanis, her eyes a mixture of warring concerns, voice tense.

  “What happened back there? Are you allright?”

  Lanis shakes her head.“I—I’m sorry. I don’t know. I just froze. I couldn’t move,” Lanis whispers, staring ahead.

  Mirem exhales and leans back in her seat, her eyes intent on Lanis. She seems pale, but otherwise normal now. After a long moment of silence, Mirem asks her, “What were you saying? I couldn’t understand it.”

  “It was a prayer. The Al-nas from the Quran.”

  “A prayer? From the Quran?” Mirem blinks with surprise. “Why?”

  Lanis nods absently, her eyes tracking the city’s darkly lit buildings as the ground shuttle accelerates onto an express-way, making for the industrial edge of the megacity.

  She tries to explain, her voice halting. “This probably sounds crazy, but at the Academy we were taught portions of every major religious text during Navigator training. Sutras, prayers, mantras. They have a positive focusing effect during the early stages of AI pairing, and are useful meditation triggers. And in other ways, too, that are harder to explain. They have a sort of… shielding effect. One of my Fleet instructors called them an ‘an elicitation of communal psychic power,’ though I’m still not totally sure I understand what that means. I honestly don’t know if he did either.”

  Mirem considers this as the ground shuttle hums along, the rain pounding against its transparent canopy.

  “Shielding effect?” Mirem asks, her face furrowing.

  Lanis shrugs. “The Demeter told Fleet that I was repeating the Gayatri Mantra while I pulled the ship through warp space. That and something in Aramaic, though it was mostly nonsense. Maybe it helped protect me, maybe it didn’t. But they’ve been hammered in as tools, and I suppose I reach for them by instinct now.”

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Unsaid is the implication of why Fleet chose religious texts as its focusing tools. Finally, Mirem chokes out a question into the hush.

  “What do you think the Anomaly is, Lanis?” She struggles for the word, and reluctantly chooses the first that springs to mind. “Some kind of demon, or something?”

  Lanis scoffs at the ridiculous idea, but swallows. Hearing the word spoken out loud forces her to confront the idea, which had always been there, lurking. She hesitates, and when she begins to speak her voice is soft and faltering.

  “I don’t know how to answer that. What is a demon? Something unknown, something uncanny, from the depths of our collective nightmares.” She turns to Mirem, her eyes bright with the fluttering reflections of the rain-swept lights that whip past them.

  “Our oldest stories must come from somewhere, Mirem.”

  They arrive at the gates of the Versk suit complex at nearly midnight. There’s no polite guard to greet them now, only the harsh glare of a lumbering auto turret that chirps with menace at the shuttle as it rolls to a stop before the dark, shuttered gates. An electronic interrogation commences over a long twenty seconds as both Lanis and Mirem ping over their Versk identification codes, which are checked and re-verified. Eventually, satisfied for the time being that they are who they say they are, the blast gates slowly roll open and an armored guard, face shield glinting in the dark rain, waves them in.

  Ash is waiting for them just inside the reception area. She always seems to be looking tired these days, her curly blonde hair somewhat limp, but her Versk technical uniform still is as spotless as ever.

  “Well, this is late even for you Lanis,” she says in a slightly bemused voice, her eyebrows raised. “Or should I say early. And you too, Mirem? This is interesting.”

  “We need to stay here tonight,” Mirem states, watching behind them as the reception doors hiss shut. “And I need to speak to Renfol first thing tomorrow morning.” Something in Mirem’s voice immediately turns Ash’s look of tired bemusement into concern.

  “Ok… Well, there should be room in the communal bunks. That’s where I’ve been sleeping, myself, off and on for the past few weeks,” Ash replies, glancing at their duffel bags. “Follow me.”

  She leads them down several long corridors, to an area of the complex that Lanis hasn’t visited before, and a common room with a small kitchen. Past this is a series of branching rooms where particularly dedicated or masochistic employees sleep on-site. Ash opens the door to one of the vacant rooms with her keycard. A softly lit bunk room is revealed: two simple beds, one against either wall, with a small adjoining bathroom.

  She leans against the door, watching as Mirem and Lanis set down their bags.

  “Is this something we should be concerned about? I can ping Security and raise our readiness level, but I’d then need to wake Renfol and explain it to Versk HQ.”

  Mirem gives a tired sigh, grimacing. “I’m not sure yet. But for now I’d rather not stir the nest.”

  Ash nods reluctantly. “Well, there are full showers down the hall if you want them, and food in the fridge. I’m going to bed, but let me know if you need anything,” she says, clearly still hoping that Mirem or Lanis will expand on what’s going on; however, it’s apparent after a moment of exhausted glances that this is a vain hope. She leaves them be.

  They unpack in silence. It’s the first time since Seto’s visit that Lanis feels like the world is finally settling into its new configuration. Even if this new world’s geography is nightmarish, she can at least begin to puzzle it out. One thought has been nagging at her this whole time, and she feels she can finally verbalize it to Mirem.

  “Should I ping my handler from Fleet?” Lanis asks. “If what your uncle said is true, then an entire ship could be compromised.”

  Mirem leans back on her bunk against the wall. Clearly, she too has been thinking of the implications of her uncle’s words.

  “I just don’t understand how something like that could happen and no one would notice,” Mirem says, running a hand through her hair. “I mean… surely the ship AI would sense something like that, and alert Fleet?” Lanis is shaking her head though, her mouth twisted.

  “If the Commander and Navigator were somehow compromised while integrated with the ship’s AI then I don’t think it would have any means of fighting off the… infection.” She hesitates over the word, but it feels right to describe the idea of what might happen. She feels the slow sinking sensation in her stomach once again.

  Lanis continues: “If Alain was in fact ‘infected,’ and then he was still allowed to return back to Terra, that means that Fleet would either be unaware of his infection, or complicit.”

  The second idea is almost too terrifying to comprehend, but there it is. Fleet, infected. God. How many ships would the Anomaly have touched? How deep could the rot possibly go?

  Mirem swallows. “Well, I guess if Fleet is complicit, then we’re all royally screwed.”

  Lanis leans back against the opposite wall, a mirror image to Mirem. They stare at each other for a few long seconds.

  “When you put it that way, there’s not much to lose,” Lanis says quietly.

  Mirem slowly nods. “I’d say do it. Ping them. Tell them what’s happened.”

  Lanis sighs, and her gaze momentarily unfocuses.

  “Done.”

  She hopes Lieutenant Tran believes her. And she hopes he has some good news.