No sooner did Marias' message end than his troops started entering the buildings. Some of the building security didn't bother resisting, surrendering immediately, while others opened fire and sought to protect their charges. The sounds of gunfire started filling the Union Quarter of the city of Brussels.

In their conference room in the Berlaymont building, the ministers of the United Earth were still struck dumb by what was occuring. "Peers? What madmen would support this?!" demanded Fluck.

"Winthrope," Gupta suggested. "And Tangri. They've favored Marias' authoritarian pushes before. And Gorchkov might back him."

"If he's brought together the security forces for the region for this, we'll never hold him off." Fluck looked with panicked eyes to Kanegawa. "You're the Defense Minister! Call in the troops, protect the government!"

Kanegawa shook his head. "Is… are you sure he's wrong? Look at what's going on! The Reformists have been pushing this agenda, now suddenly there's alien rifles and a bioweapon, maybe something is subverting the Union."

"You can't believe that!"

As they fussed Kaveri leaned in toward Crawford. "Sir, Captain Dale's operations team is standing by. With our Marines we could nip this coup in the bud, and we can beam out any threatened aid workers in short time."

Crawford ran his hand over his chin in thought. "I understand what you're proposin', Captain, and it's mighty temptin'." He shook his head. "But it's not what we're here for. We can't just intervene with these folks' politics willy-nilly, it'll turn on us."

"With all due respect, Deputy Secretary, the way things look, they are going to turn on us regardless. Whatever off-world forces are manipulating the situation will see to that."

She saw the doubt glint in his eyes. He wasn't sure he was making the right call. Nevertheless his jaw set and he shook his head. "They have to ask," he insisted.

Marias' diatribe played over the speakers in the Jayhawk cockpit. Robert finished latching the arm guard of his blue combat armor into place and pulled the brown robe that Mastrash Kilaba gifted him onto his shoulders. It was, perhaps, a silly thing to add, but it was an extra touch that complemented the armor and gave a unique look that he thought was an advantage in conflict. It also served to give a uniform feel as Gina and Talara pulled their robes over their own sets of combat armor. I'd feel better if Lucy were here, but she's still off active duty.

A holo-viewer screen showed the bridge, where Meridina was on duty. "We have no orders authorizing intervention."

"No, but as a Paladin, I've got some leeway on that," he answered. "I'll have to answer to Maran and President Morgan for it, but I'm not going to allow our people to be killed or made hostages."

"What are your intentions, then, Captain?"

"Wait at the Berlaymont building under cloak, move in if absolutely necessary or it gets authorized." He gestured to the helm controls. "Talara, are we ready?"

She took over. "All systems are ready, and a platoon of Major Anders' Marines are in the loading area. The major is preparing another strike force on the Gonzales."

He nodded. "Cloak and take us out."

The Jayhawk rippled from sight as she launched from the shuttle bay, banking down toward the Earth below after she cleared the Aurora.

Self-diagnosis was always a tricky matter for a doctor to perform, but in this case Leo felt justified by the situation he was in. Pain is consistent with a stun shot with a pulse gun. The partial motor paralysis backs that up. I'm still conscious, so it wasn't full power. I should start getting some motor control back soon, although it won't do me any good right now.

Rose's hands shook slightly, but not enough to completely throw off her aim. If she pulled the trigger he'd take another shot, and the weapon was set to kill.

On the screen Ke'mani'pala was manipulating the controls of her station. Rose kept looking back from her to Leo. "Go faster," she urged. "Delete it all!"

"There are redundancies," Ke protested.

Leo found his voice box was at least working. "Rose, what are you doing? What is this?"

"It's about ending this," she said. "Stopping this abuse of telepaths, once and for all. The plague will see to that."

"How will a plague stop it?" Leo found a little strength returning to his voice. "A plague that anyone will quickly see doesn't hurt telepaths? It'll just give people another reason to hate them."

The look in her eyes was wild. Fury, grief, and shame burned alike in the intensity Leo saw there. She met him eye to eye even as her gun shook slightly. "They'll fear them more," she said. "Once the plague's run its course, telepaths will be the majority here. The banals won't pose a threat, ever again."

Leo swallowed to try and clear the lump of fear he had in his throat. Given the mosquito-based vector of the plague and the logistics of trying to deal with them, they were pressed for time. If they could get a vaccine into place now, then they had a shot at containing the outbreak with vaccinated populations. If they didn't, its global spread became more assured with every passing day.

WIth this in mind, he pressed onward despite the risk. "You're talking about a world with billions of dead, Rose! It'll break all of civilization, and telepaths will suffer from it just as much. Even worse, you're leaving them with the stigma of benefiting from the mass slaughter of billions of their neighbors, their loved ones and friends!"

"It'll be better in the long run," she insisted. "It… it has to be."

"It won't. It doesn't work like that."

Rose turned on him with violence in her voice. "What do you know?!" she shrieked. "You weren't here! You didn't live here, you didn't see them take them away! You didn't hear the things they said! You didn't deal with the terrible things they justified, the terrible things they were doing to my little sister!" The ferocity of her tone made her voice grow more hoarse by the syllable. "They're animals, Doctor, and this is precisely what they deserve, what we all deserve."

"Even you? With all the compassion you've shown, you think you deserve this?"

Leo hoped it might make her reconsider, but even with the tears welling up in her eyes, she didn't stop. "Yes," she said. "I do." She directed her eyes toward the viewer again. "Show me your work. Show me you're destroying the data, or I'll kill him."

"Very well. You are making a horrible mistake," Ke'mani'pala answered.

"Just do it!"

Thomas was completely knackered. Absolute, bone-deep weariness. Since breakfast the last several hours had been thirty minutes on, fifteen off to let his cardiovascular system rest and recover, but the repeated strain was starting to get to him. Then Abigail walked in the door doing a little dance. The sort of dance she'd done when she was correct, ever since she was a child.

"Good news I take it?" He asked. His patient was unconscious, so he could chit chat for a moment without interruption.

"Well, you know how much I love being right! A vaccine is almost done, and their working on an anti-viral solution but once it's in the cell that virus is… well let's just say it's in the anomaly file. Spread in water and can hitch a ride in the cells of aquatic organisms like mosquitoes to spread directly, or into new water bodies. We don't have much time before it goes global."

"Ah! Good thing you were right then." Thomas replied, but then Kusko piped in.

"Why bother?" She asked. "The Oldtypes die, it becomes a Newtype planet and Oldtypes can't hurt them anymore."

Abigail winced. No one had taken on this conversation with her. "Lots of reasons. For starters, the deaths of billions would traumatize every telepath on this planet and lead to the collapse of civilization. The other reason is a bit more abstract."

Kusko's follow up was genuinely curious, if blunt. "I'm not dumb, I can handle abstract. Lay it on me."

"The Law of Contradiction." Thomas said flatly, and Kusko, not getting the reference at all, just stared at him. "Basically, everyone is the product of themselves and everything that came before them, interacting with the material conditions of the here and now. The throngs of mundanes here don't deserve to die. Some of them might have to, but over time many can be educated and change." He shrugged. "They're still people. And a lot of them lack any kind of context or framework to do anything but what they've been doing. Take Lily here as an exam—"

"What did you say?" Abigail asked, suddenly ramrod straight but also practically ecstatic. But before Thomas could reply, Kusko felt like a die was cast. She held up a hand and sought, listening to the currents of everything around her to peer into the now-collapsing-future possibilities in her immediate surroundings.

"Get back to the lab, now." She commanded in no uncertain terms. She couldn't tell them, or it would affect the outcome. "I have to go warn Richmond. Go!"

They didn't question it. They both booked it. Kusko also left, locking down the shuttle as she did to protect the unconscious telepath inside. She felt as much as heard the snapping of branches outside the camp perimeter, the tiny voices of men and women about to seize tactical surprise, trepidation, guilt. Uncertainty was collapsing even as she ran, finding the Lieutenant Commander at her little command post near the main entrance. For her part, Richmond noticed the commotion and was standing to face her.

"Ms. Al, what seems to be the problem?" She asked. Too out or breath to speak, Kusko spoke directly into her mind.

United Earth attack imminent, foreign agents inside the camp.

"How do you—" Richmond's perfectly understandable question was interrupted.

Precognition. Alert your men.

That actually confirmed something Richmond suspected already, and she tapped on her own communicator. "Prepare for imminent enemy contact." What officers she had commanding the enlisted security forces answered back in the affirmative, without even ten seconds of pregnant silence to spare.

A few calls of warning from those members of the militia who could — and were trained to — sense hostile thoughts was all the warning anyone else got. Gunfire erupted from the perimeter and cut several of them down, but Richmond's men were protected by personal shields. Bullets shattered against them on impact in puffs of metal and cavitation.

A flash of warning she couldn't even comprehend, and Kusko violently shoved Richmond a fractional second before a shot from a pulse gun passed through the space her face had occupied. She drew her own PPG and fired back, as additional pulse guns opened fire on Richmond's men, the camp militia, and the United Earth Forces.

Pandemonium erupted.

The Berlaymont building and its environs showed through the cockpit of the Jayhawk. "Put us on the roof," Robert said from his seat. "That should ensure we're inside that anti-beaming shield."

"Bringing us in," Talara answered.

While she brought them to the landing, the ship's comms activated. Meridina's voice filled the cockpit. "Robert, we have a hostage situation in the Atlanta telepath camp. It is Leonard."

Robert let out a weary sigh. Of course, something else has to go wrong. "What's going on?"

"A member of the camp staff is holding Leonard hostage, and Commander Richmond's units are being attacked by some of their militia and the United Earth military. The hostage taker is demanding we destroy all of our work on curing the bioweapon."

Robert grimaced. "If we lose that work, even if we start over, it'll make stopping this thing a lot harder. It'll kill more people."

"Dr. Ke'mani'pala is presenting them with apparent cooperation, but Jarod has already backed up all relevant data."

"Should we divert to Atlanta?" asked Gina.

Robert drew in a breath and concentrated, considering the matter and seeing how his instincts, tied to the Flow of Life, led him. Both places were important and would require full commitments to see success. Should he save the UE government or stop the hostage situation?

There was no clear or easy answer, but Robert came to a conclusion anyway. "If we don't stop Marias, it means this world ends up in civil war, and we wouldn't be able to stop the plague anyway. We'll have to deal with this first." Robert rose from his seat. "Talara, hold the ship down. Gina and I will be joining the Marines in the hold. Have the transporters ready for squad-by-squad deployment."

"Yes sir," Talara answered.

The arguing in the conference room of the Berlaymont didn't subside, even as renewed reports came in of the approach of the security minister's troops. Kaveri felt a sense of resignation over the folly of it all.

"Minister Kanegawa, there's still time!" Fluck insisted. "Call out the army!"

"I cannot guarantee they won't side with Marias," he countered. "I am not even sure we should be stopping him! The Reformists are a clear threat to the cohesion of our nation. Their proposed reforms would cripple us against Dissolutionist terrorism and would leave us vulnerable to further forced concessions. We might lose the entire Union!"

"You do not know that, you cannot possibly know," Gupta insisted. "The Reformist states want a solidified civil rights position from the Union. It is something we should consider. It would certainly undermine the Dissolutionists' arguments!"

"It will risk another global war in the future," Kanegawa insisted. "We can't afford another one, especially not now with other worlds to consider." He gestured toward the Alliance team. "We must remain strong, and maybe Marias is the best way to do it. He can consolidate the government and we can wait for a better time to reform."

"If you don't stop him now, it will guarantee a new war," Fluck argued. "The Reformists will not allow their governments to be seized as traitors, they'll fight back!"

"If so, it proves their loyalty to the Union is weak," Kanegawa retorted. "Giving in to them will simply lead to another, greater war in the long run. No, the more I think about it, the more that we may need a period of strong central rule to suppress decentralizing forces that would weaken our government."

Kaveri rose from her seat. "With all due respect, you are not considering this problem fully, Minister."

Kanegawa's eyes honed in on her. "This is not an affair of your Alliance, Captain. Your input is neither requested nor required."

"I do not speak as a Captain of the Alliance Stellar Navy," she answered, her eyes meeting his without flinching. "I speak as a child of the Earth of E5B1. An Earth that confronted the same problems your Earth now faces. We have fought our own conflicts concerning the power of EarthGov. We had to deal with the rise of telepathy among our population, and then the existence of alien powers beyond our solar system. Indeed, without the Centauri first contact we may have had a war just like the one your world just fought, with forces seeking to break the Earth Alliance up."

Kanegawa did not respond. Gupta, perhaps seeing opportunity in Kaveri's words, nodded. "Please, Captain, continue."

"Like your Union, the Earth Alliance made choices about its role toward the Earth. I am sad to say those choices were not happy ones. EarthGov has accumulated power and turned toward the authoritarianism that Minister Marias preaches, and you, Minister Kanegawa, consider so lightly. But the result was not greater security. The result was more conflict. Some, like the War of the Shining Star, killed millions. The others were smaller conflicts as different colonies or nations, even continents, sought to break away from an EarthGov they felt oppressed them. Ultimately, these conflicts helped to fuel the rise of outright fascism in our people."

"Our treatment of our telepaths led down that same road. We took them and made them into recording devices under the law, we drove them into a ghetto we called 'Psi Corps', and then we used them as we saw fit. As tools of power, as weapons against the enemy. The result is a captive population of eighteen million souls who live or die by the word of those appointed by EarthGov to oversee them. Men who turned their captives into a tool for the oppression of others."

"We barely escaped the victory of fascism on our Earth, Minister. The right man in the right place at the right time swayed the balance against those forces. But they still remain to haunt us."

"Your world has a chance." Kaveri was speaking to all of the assembled now. "You have a chance to do better than mine did. You can avoid the bloodshed and terror that my Earth has suffered with, all you need to do is make the decision here to walk the better path."

She stopped and waited for them to react.

The range of motion was returning to Leo's limbs. HIs motor functions were recovering steadily from the stun shot. He hoped that soon he might be able to go for the gun with a reasonable chance of success.

For the moment, he kept talking. "You are ready to die?"

"I am," she said, her lip quivering. Not from fear, Leo thought, but the sheer emotions roiling through her. "It's the least I can do for her."

"For your sister, Lily." Leo swallowed. "I know it hurt you to see them take her, and I know it still hurts that you've never found her, but this isn't going to fix it, Rose! I've seen enough death to know that! It never fixes it! It only means more loss!"

"You… you don't get it, do you?" Rose demanded. "You fly around in your ships with all of your technology, and you live like you do, and you don't understand just how evil people can get. How wrong things can be."

"I do understand!" Leo insisted. "Rose, I got into this work because I saw suffering people that needed someone to heal them! That's why I've become a doctor, to heal people, and that's all I've ever sought. And I've had to work hard at it, and sometimes, sometimes I couldn't save them." His lip quivered as his mind transported him back to the Aurora OR where Joshua Marik's leukemia-battered body bled to death on the inside, no matter what he did to stop it. Or all of those over the years he had to black tag in triage because their wounds were too grievous, or who died without him being able to stop it.

The mutilated Turian soldier on New Brittany. Dr. Lumenaram, blowing himself up in the Cybermen "conversion" unit they transformed the Aurora OR into. And all of the other members of the Aurora crew who'd died because he didn't have what it would take to save them.

He swallowed. "Life is precious, Rose. All life. The people who took Lily forgot that. They let their hate and their fear guide them and they did terrible things. Don't go down that road, please. This isn't the legacy you want to leave for Lily."

Rose's lip quivered and Leo thought he was getting through to her. Her hands started to lower the weapon.

A new voice boomed in the room. "Do not let this spineless mute come between you and our work, Rose Williams," a man said. His voice seemed to echo in Leo's mind, as if the words were vibrating inside his brain.

It helped Leo recognize them. He looked beyond Rose to the newly-arrived man.

Lawton, the camp security chief, looked no different at first glance. But there was a difference in his posture and the way he carried himself. He was plainly not the same man Leo met when he arrived, with a stern, commanding look in his eyes that seemed to transfix Rose and keep her in place.

"You have been annoyances," he said, glaring toward Leo and then the viewer. When his eyes narrowed on Leo again, Leo felt his diaphragm seize up. It was like his body's respiratory system was locked up, the autonomic nerves no longer allowed to transmit the orders that led to his breathing. Instinctive panic came to his face as he tried to force a breath to no avail.

"Alien, you will begin an immediate computer system purge on your entire ship," Lawton demanded. "Or you will watch Doctor Gillam die quite slowly."

In another part of the camp, hundreds of meters away, everything around her unfolded as a chaotic mess, but in Kusko Al's mind there was a certain sublime clarity. In front of her, traitor militia, telepaths all. Behind her, Alliance troops and loyalist militia did battle with the UE security forces. Between superior weapons and personal shields, Alliance troops were not in much danger from the United Earth soldiers, but they'd be cut down by organized telepaths very quickly, but she couldn't deal with all of them alone. Camp militia were leaderless and disorganized, still reeling from the shock of surprise contact.

Kusko knew exactly what she had to do. She reached out with her mind and absolute authority. Kusko Al, Psi Corps, I am assuming command in the absence of Mr. Lawton. She then glyphed a mental image that highlighted each telepath in formation as alternately green or red. You are now designated. Greens, begin suppressive operations against UE forces. Reds, force-protection operations for alliance security. I've got offensive operations against traitor forces. She didn't want to order them to kill their own comrades, afterall. That could get messy and lead to defections.

The militia complied, half of them split from the line under cover to move closer to Richmond and her troops and started jamming out attack probes. The other half, now having concrete direction, began assaulting United Earth troops. Some simply went down screaming, others shot their own men or pulled their own grenade pins. It created confusion in addition to casualties, and muted the effect of their raw numbers.

Then she tapped a button on her omnitool, extending an orange hued straight blade from it's holographic emitter on her left hand. Blade in one hand, PPG in the other, she went to work. She bolted straight in, rolling under a fusillade of pulse gun fire and moving with inhuman grace to side-step another that normal human reactions could never have allowed her to dodge, but she saw the probability cones of incoming fire collapse into unity before the triggers were actually pulled. She wasn't inside the OODA loops of her enemies, she was inside their causal chain.

Kusko dove head-first over a crumbling brick facade and drove her omniblade into one man's chest. Blood fountained from his mouth as his mind screamed in agony and terror. Her PPG was already pointed at another woman who was coming around the corner and fired before she was even visible. She didn't even look, the woman's soul was pulled into the Door before her mind was even aware it was dead. An attempt was made to batter down her mental defenses, but it skittered over them like a handgun attempting to penetrate the armor of a tank. She traced it back to its source. Inspiration flashed across her mind.

'I'll need that one later.' Instead of killing him, she shattered his own blocks like so much glass and dropped him into a coma.

It felt like an eternity, but in reality it had been about twenty seconds since she'd first gotten moving. It was going to be a long few minutes.

Robert and Gina stood on the transporter pad in the Jayhawk cargo area while Marine teams under one of Anders' subordinates remained ready to join them. With his omnitool Robert was tied into the Jayhawk's sensors and the indicators showing the locations of the rampaging security troops in the building. They were nearly halfway up the building now. The defenders were fighting valiantly, but they lacked the numbers to hold every staircase and hallway. While they had President Lawrence safely under control, Premier Gorchkov was already a captive of Marias' troops, and they had nobody who could effectively stop the squads heading for the conference room.

If we don't stop this soon, Captain Varma and Secretary Crawford and the others will be hostages.

"Prepare to go on my mark," he said. I hope they ask for help soon, or I'm about to step on a diplomatic landmine.

Compared to before there was silence in the conference room, save for the quiet conversation Gupta was having with Lawrence over their internal comm system. When Gupta lowered her phone it was with resignation. "The President will not authorize a request for help unless the remaining Executive Council are in unanimous agreement."

"I call yea!" Fluck declared. "Marias will either corrupt the Union into something that deserves to collapse, or he'll destroy it with another war! If we just sit down with the Reformists, we can make a deal that everyone can live with. They'll accept a greater central focus if we guarantee civil rights."

"And how will the rest of the world feel if we concede like that?" Kanegawa demanded. "How will they take it if we repeal the Telepath Registration and Regulation Act as the Reformists demand? So many of these people fought for the unified Earth, if we undermine it to appease the Reformists they'll side with Marias!"

"You overestimate that sentiment," Gupta insisted.

"I've spoken to my officers, I've spoken to their soldiers, they fought and died for the idea of the United Earth, and we have to honor that!"

Fluck let out an angry "Pah!" "You're just afraid of losing power," he accused. "If we step down from emergency control, the Defense Ministry will lose prerogatives."

"I'm afraid we'll turn the army over to Marias! I'm afraid the Reformists' loyalty to our ideals is weak and insincere, and they'll use any concessions to break the Union into irrelevance. We'll be no better than the old UN from before the Third World War!"

"Minister, you may be surprised by their sentiments and how much you would agree with them," Kaveri remarked. "They fought at your side against the Dissolutionists for a reason. You speak of the sacrifices of your soldiers, but remember they sacrificed too." When Kanegawa didn't respond right away she continued. "You have a chance here, sir. A chance few ever have: to decide the history of a world. The choice you make here, today, will shape the world you wake up in tomorrow. Do you really want that world to be shaped by your fear?"

Kanegawa's face made it clear he was quite fearful. Fearful of Marias' troops, fearful of his military commanders feeling betrayed, fearful of the world descending back into war. He swallowed. Slowly the look on his face became one of resignation, but not a fearful resignation. "You are correct, Captain," he said. "I'm afraid. I… I lost my children in the war. My hometown. The Union is what I have left, and I fear for it. But fear is what led to the war, and it will bring another one." He let out a breath and brought up his phone. He tapped a single key. "General Roberts, this is Minister Kanegawa. Minister Marias is attempting to seize control of the Union government. I'm ordering you to dispatch your troops into the capital immediately, and warn all of your commands globally to suppress the Security Directorate."

There was a tense moment as they waited to see if Kanegawa's senior officers would obey his commands. Kaveri felt a little surge of relief when Kanegawa nodded. "That's right, General, the Security Minister's gone too far. We'll do what we can to stop his forces here, but get those troops into position. Thank you." He hung up. "Marias will have me shot now," he said to the assembled. "Most likely all of us."

As if to punctuate that remark, they could hear not-too-distant gunfire. Kaveri glanced at her omnitool and confirmed that at least a dozen armed figures were on the floor and closing in on their location. "Not if you ask for our help," she said. "Let us stop them for you."

Kanegawa pursed his lips. Gupta said, "I'm in favor," as did the other ministers in the room. "Minister, we all die otherwise," she asserted.

"This could be used against us." After saying those words, he let out a small sigh. "But we'll be alive. Madame President, I concur with my colleagues. We will need the Allied Systems' help."

Lawrence's voice came over the speaker on Gupta's phone. "Very well. Since the loyal elements of the Executive Council are in concurrence, Deputy Secretary Crawford, I formally request your forces aid the legitimate government against this coup attempt."

"Gladly, Madame President, we'll get right on it." Crawford nodded to Kaveri.

"Varma to Dale," she said into her omnitool. "Captain, aid is formally requested. We need it immediately." She said that even as the sound of footfalls outside grew louder. Marias' troops were seconds away from arriving.

Twin flashes of light formed in the room, in apparent defiance of the anti-beaming shield, and coalesced into the forms of Robert and Gina. The collected ministers were bewildered to see just two rescuers and both wearing robes over their armor. The sight further bewildered them when they saw neither had firearms. The room was filled with the twin snap-hiss of lightsabers igniting.

The door flew open. Security troops appeared in the doorway, rifles raised. "Surrender or—"

Robert's empty left hand came up. The ministers watched in amazement as the half-dozen soldiers in the doorway went flying as if struck by an explosion. He and Gina rushed forward, their weapons buzzing in the air, and soon emerald and sapphire flashes outside of the room were joined by surprised shouts and the occasional scream of surprise and pain. From her seat, Kaveri could see that they were fighting non-lethally, intentionally avoiding fatal blows while disarming their adversaries (in some cases, literally).

After ten seconds the two figures re-entered the room. Robert's green lightsaber extinguished and he nodded respectfully to the assembled. "I'm Captain Robert Dale," he introduced himself to the Executive Council members. "A Paladin of the Alliance. This is a member of my operations team, Gina Inviere." He gestured to Gina. "We've got Marines beaming in to clear the coup forces. If you want to tie us into your command and control, we'll adhere to it."

That was for Crawford's sake and for Kanegawa, who immediately took Robert up on the offer.

The vise-like grip on Leo's diaphragm refused to relent. Try as he might he couldn't breathe, and his body began reacting as he expected. His vision started to go out as he looked at the horrified face of Rose, her gun still pointed toward him.

Then, for a moment, relief. He sucked in a greedy breath and exhaled. The moment his exhalation finished the vise returned. He couldn't breathe again.

Lawton was glaring at the viewer. "I can sense your deceit, alien. You're backing up your research while making a show of destroying it. You will purge all of your ship's computer systems now or he will die."

"Once your hostage is dead, you have no more power," Ke'mani'pala replied. "You cannot kill him."

"No? Even as I speak my followers are seizing the others from your ship that are in our camp. I'll bring them in here and make you watch as I kill them, one by one."

There was a malevolence in the man's tone that was chilling. Leo noticed the torn expression on Rose's face. His mouth moved as he tried to speak, even with no air coming from his lungs. You don't have to do this.

Rose seemed to know what he tried to say. She swallowed and the gun in her hands quivered with greater violence.

The vise disappeared briefly. Leo brought in a breath, and spoke as he exhaled. "This is wrong," he managed to say before his breathing was cut off.

Tears flowed down her cheeks. Leo could see the tension as his vision went back to the brink of cutting out. Whatever her feelings, Rose wasn't a killer, not deep down. It was one thing to be complicit in a plague that might kill people you don't see, but holding a gun on someone, helping to strangle the life out of them… that was entirely different. It would be even if they'd never talked, hadn't worked together, gotten to know one another.

Rose's hands shook as the gun turned away from him. It focused on Lawton. "No," she said. "You… you can't do this, you can't kill someone like this!"

He never lashed out. In the span of a moment Rose's hands opened wide and she dropped the weapon. A choked breath came from her throat before she dropped to her knees.

"Your anger made you useful, mute," said Lawton. "But now, your use is at an end." He looked at Rose with murderous intent as she fell over, trying desperately to breathe. "Watch carefully, alien. This is the fate your shipmates will suffer if you don't cooperate."

Suddenly, Lawton's eyes widened in surprise. The vise on Leo's chest let go. He could breath again and he sucked in air with wild-abandon. He didn't notice the two other figures in the door until one of them spoke.

"Run." Thomas croaked through clenched teeth. "We can't hold him off for long." What Leo couldn't see was the withering series of weaponized medical probes they'd surprised Lawton with, attacks that slid off even his casual-defenses like water off a swan's back. He'd been concealing his power from them, just as he'd been concealing his intent.

He struck back, aiming to incapacitate, and it took the combined strength of their gestalted mind — which would have been a match for a Psi Cop — to hold him back. That same attack was paired with a message.

Join me, my brethren. I am Hab-Kuzad of the Ministry of Fate, and I come to you as a fellow telepath! Your people are just as oppressed by the mutes. The Ministry is ready to save you and bring you into the fold.

And they believed him. He honestly did think he was helping; that the only way for telepaths to be safe was to rule over mundanes in perpetuity and by whatever means necessary.

But that didn't change the fact that he wanted to murder a world.

Fuck That! We're not helping you murder billions, they replied in unison, and to emphasize their refusal, attempted to provoke a catastrophic seizure.

This time his defenses caught the attack, breaking it with little apparent effort. He might have flung it back toward them, but he held that back, instead pressing forth his will and the thought within. Mutes outnumber us by a billion fold, he reminded them. They will not be missed.

His mental voice echoed through the connection with the force of a piston. Inevitability filled every thought, every word in the sentiment of ultimate triumph Hab-Kuzad projected into them. It is the destiny of the Esper to rule over the mute. For this they try to destroy us, but we have beaten them every time. We will always beat them. We were meant to be Kings!

The words came as hammer blows on their defenses, laced with the learned superiority he felt toward non-telepaths, and his conviction that they too would join him once they understood the world as he saw it. It was an inevitability as true as the solar winds, as mathematics, as gravity. The telepath will rule, the mute will obey or be crushed. The telepath serves as the agent of Fate itself and acts in that fashion in all things.

But to the Spencers, it was fascism. Telepathic space fascism; like Bester turned up to a fever pitch and bolstered by past glories. The certainty itself was an attack, that feeling of inevitability intended to erode their resistance. However, it had the opposite effect. Fascism and its antecedents were the driving force of their own oppression, and they were not about to trade one oppressor for another; or to accept their lot in life as a servant so long as they had a slave beneath them. And render life into a mere caricature of itself? We think not. We will fight our oppressors and win, but we will not become you.

Hab-Kuzad sensed their sentiments as his attacks battered away at them. It confounded him. Every telepath loyally following him in the camp had bowed to these inevitabilities. These two resisted. Why? How? He redoubled his attack, this time throwing in recrimination, as if they were children to be lectured to and scolded for defiance. You defy Fate! You defy your own legacy! And for what? I offer you a future of glory and purpose! You have nothing that can compare!

Your glory, your purpose. Not Ours. Dozens of memories of mutual support and community coursed through their minds, but there was that one. Millions of telepaths staring down planetary destruction and rising up with one telepathic voice, even then in hope and determination for a better future. If not for them, then for survivors who'd made it off-world or were still in the colonies. The song of their own people rose in a great mental chorus across the entirely of the earth.

'We are strong in each other, we're sister and brother, And we will all come together in a better place, a better place than this. Our love will guide you, Our love will hold you. And our love will show us the way.'

When they allowed that memory to fade, they continued. We have no desire to inflict upon others what has been inflicted upon us. That is the spite of a child, and it only ends in tears. Just the opposite, in time, we'll eliminate all oppression by leading the mundanes toward a better future for everyone.

The certainty in the Spencers met the inevitability in Hab-Kuzad's beliefs and produced a straining equilibrium. His raw power and conviction were yet insufficient to break down their assured knowledge of the love and common purpose in their community, purpose without strict control as Hab-Kuzad envisioned. But his power was still great and their efforts, great as they were, could not break through to stop the onslaught.

I will not be beaten by this misguided foolishness, he insisted through the link. The Ministry will have this world! You two cannot stop it!

Which was when his mind was assailed in the telepathic equivalent of a sucker-punch. Hab-Kuzad's defenses held, but it was difficult and he reeled from the shock of it.

Good thing there's more than these two! Kusko's mental voice boomed through his conscious thoughts. It was almost as big a shock to the Spencer twins who didn't exactly disguise it.

What can I say? I prefer utopian dreamers to dystopic ones was her only response. Then, she took off a glove and touched the back of Thomas' neck, joining their gestalt and making for a much more even fight.

To the Spencers' certainty in their sense of family came Kusko's experience. In Hab-Kuzad's system she saw the control and bloodiness of the Zabis intensified to a degree she never imagined. He would enslave her and other Newtypes with chains greater than any Zabi ever conceived.

That is what is required of us! he raged, with Kusko's defiance bolstering that of the Spencers. The Fates have decreed that role! To defy the Fates is to deny reality! His fury at that defiance briefly bolstered his attack. Wave after wave of hectoring washed over the three, scolding them for defying the way of the world, for denying the glory of their purpose as ordained by the All-Father.

The very idea was preposterous. History and reality don't work that way, it does not use men. It is the actions of men pursuing their own ends. You have been lied to, used, just as the mundanes use us now. It was countered with weaponized dialectical materialism.

You know nothing!

Both sides of the fight were reeling. Given time the Spencers and Kusko might wear him down, but there were good odds one or more would stroke out first.

That was when Leo returned with Rose, and this time, they weren't alone.

The council of five that governed the camp joined them, Hab-Kuzad's words echoing in their minds along with the defiance of his opponents. Nysha held her hands out. Walter and Irma took those hands, and their hands in turn were taken by their other peers. Five minds became one, albeit clumsily, and as one they struck at Hab-Kuzad's mind.

Theirs was not the same certainty that the Spencers had, nor the same exact experiences as Kusko's. But they had something of both. The experiences they and their people in the camp had with the forms of oppression their world still labored with armored them from Hab-Kuzad's conviction of inevitability, as they recognized it for what it was. From the five joined minds came something like pity, as Hab-Kuzad could not conceive of anything but oppression.

While his defenses held against the Spencers and Kusko, he turned his eyes towards the five. You would fight for the banals? The people who experimented upon your families? Who turn your children into weapons? His attack was a clever one, as it played upon the resentments they felt. The anger at the injustices they'd endured. This world should be yours. Help me destroy the mutes and those that would stand for them!

The appeal resonated. They struggled against it. Why should they fight to protect people who oppressed them? Why not let them all die and inherit this world?

Nysha's eyes moved away from Hab-Kuzad's, trying to escape the pressure of his powerful, trained mind. She found herself looking at Leo.

He and Rose weren't moving. Didn't dare interfere, for fear of harming the entire group in some way. But seeing him and the worry on his face, even as the blood trickled from her nostrils, reminded Nysha of something he'd said. Something that resonated within her.

Because we're better than that.

She'd thought those words were silly. Those of a man who lived in the luxury of his spaceship and never faced cruel reality. But then she'd seen him live up to the compassion in those words. The hours he spent saving people without thought or hope of reward. The world might be cruel, but Leo and his people showed they didn't have to wallow in it. They could be better.

Walter added to the thought. His memory of history came to the gestalt's aid, recalled the words of a man that swayed his heart and, through him, their collective conscience. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. The words resonated through the gestalt as they considered the source and Walter's unwavering faith that Dr. King's words applied to telepath and non-telepath as much as it did to those of black and white skin.

These 'banals' came to help us, the gestalt challenged Hab-Kuzad. They fought for us. They healed us. And they asked us for nothing. They only want us to be free!

Freedom was a word Hab-Kuzad could not parse mentally. In his world of control it was virtually meaningless. A word with nothing behind it. Freedom is a fiction! his mind raged instinctively at the idea.

But for both gestalts, it was more. It was choice. It was life. It was the future they sought and they thought was worth dying for.

Against the intensity of an idea he could not truly fathom, Hab-Kuzad's power failed. His defenses crumbled against their defiance of his convictions and the raw power behind them.

For all of his training, eight minds with the right beliefs, the right convictions, was simply too much to stop.

As the realization of defeat came, a subconscious impulse triggered in his mind, a programmed reaction to this outcome. The Spencers tried to stop it but to no avail, and all they could do was break the connection and urge Nysha's gestalt to do the same.

They did at the last possible moment as the implant hidden in Hab-Kuzad's brain activated. A powerful agent flooded through his head, dissolving brain cells and tissue. He screamed and collapsed. All eight telepaths felt the cold sensation of the Door opening and drawing him in, slamming shut a moment later.

Leo rushed up to the fallen man, his omnitool set for medical scanning. He swallowed at the results. "Looks like a suicide charge of some kind, an organic acidic agent's already liquifying his brain." Leo remembered the mission to Solaris, where a NEUROM operative had reportedly triggered a similar device when facing capture.

"Yeah." Dr. Spencer replied. "It was… automatic, pre-conditioned in his mind, he couldn't stop it if he wanted to." Her voice was strange, mostly because she had a handkerchief to stop the nose bleed. The other reason telepaths never wore white.

Leo stood back up and faced the viewer. "Doctor, we have backups I hope?"

"Of course, Doctor. Commander Jarod is restoring everything now. We'll be back to work shortly."

"Good to hear." With his concerns there re-assured, he turned to Abigail and Thomas. "Thanks for the rescue."

"Our pleasure. Though thank Kusko, she warned us and got us moving." Thomas replied. "Speaking of which, Rose, there's someone here you should see."

Rose looked at them with some confusion. Confusion that swiftly gave way to shock and hope as she thought about what they were saying.

Leo looked from her to them. And then he thought of the telepath girl kept by the cell and his eyes widened.

It was at the behest of the Earth Union's General Roberts that Robert and Gina fought their way into the Security Ministry building, advancing ahead of Earth army soldiers while the Aurora Marines guarded alternative exits.

Their opponents were of little concern, given the locals' training to fight telepathic foes didn't amount to much against their training and abilities. They took careful, conscientious care to not kill anyone they fought.

And yet, they could feel death when they approached Marias' office. It was a fortified door, so Gina and Robert cut through the hinges with their lightsabers before knocking it down. Inside were two dead bodies, Ministers Winthrope and Tangri, and a very alive Marias bringing his pistol up toward his forehead. They felt his intention to pull the trigger.

Robert's hand motioned toward the wall. Invisible force ripped the gun from Marias' hand. He stared at his open hand for a moment before scowling at them. "I won't be used against my homeworld," he swore. "I'll make you kill me!"

"Your people will judge you for your crimes, Minister," Robert said, glancing down at the bodies. "Enough blood's been shed."

Marias snarled in anger at that. "You think you can conquer us with kindness, divide us with your lies about rights. But my people will see you for what you are. They'll fight."

"Your people are tired of fighting," Gina pointed out. "They want peace."

Marias slumped into his chair, a defeated man, and did nothing but glower as Earth troops came in and took custody of him. Robert and Gina looked around the room and judged what was in sight, including reports. "Odd," Gina said, looking over a stack of orders and papers.

"Hrm?" Robert looked away from a photo of Marias with a young woman in a set of digital camo BDUs. "What?"

"He's been planning this for a while," Gina said. "The dates here…" She checked with the displays on his office. "If he'd waited another two days, he would have had three times the forces he used. And he would have had a unit in place to seize General Roberts and the rest of the military command."

Robert's brow furrowed. His eyes moved over a small shrine: a folded Earth Union flag and a medal in a case with a photo of the same young woman in full uniform. His daughter, Robert thought, given the facial resemblance. She died in the war. After that distracting thought he returned to Gina's findings. "He might have won," he said aloud. "Or would have had a better chance of winning, at least."

"So why did he act today instead?"

Given what was happening in Atlanta, Robert had an idea about that. "We'll let the local authorities figure that out," he said. "For now, let's get back to the Berlaymont. I want to get an update from Atlanta."

The fighting was well over and the rogue security forces turned over to their comrades. Richmond was looking for Leo when she saw him, trailing the Spencers and Kusko. Rose was with him, trembling as she walked. "Doctor, are you alright?"

"I am."

"Have you found Lawton? His people seem confused about his role in this."

"He's in the lab, dead. And he was a NEUROM agent."

Richmond got the feeling he had something else on his mind. She ended up following as they approached the Brahmaputra.

Thomas, with something of a dramatic flourish and overdone pressing of keys, opened up the runabout's door. He led them into the living area where a young woman was asleep on the cot.

It took Leo a second look to recognize his captor of the other night. She'd been cleaned up, although her blonde hair was still a mess. He heard a sharp gasp from Rose. Her knees hit the floor as she dropped down onto them.

"She was taken to Andersonville and her memories got scrambled." Thomas explained. "I've spent the last day reconstructing those memories. There are still some fuzzy patches and missing association paths, but I can go ahead and wake her up."

He did so, reaching into Lily's mind and bringing her conscious mind out of the void-state he had it in. She emerged from that state remembering the conversation she was having with Kusko, but also having all of her original memories. She looked around, and saw her sister.

The teenager looked blankly at the scrubs-clad woman at first. The memories in her head recognized the face, broadly, but emotionally she was stuck. Now that it was conscious her mind was trying to find the emotions in those old memories.

Leo watched the tears flowing down Rose's face. She looked frozen, as if she feared this was a trick or a dream. She sniffled and managed the word "Lily".

A little gasp came from the throat of the teenage girl. Her mind gently probed at Rose's.

Rose nodded. When her mouth opened again, it was to begin singing. "I come home in the morning light/My mother says, 'When you gonna live your life right?'..."

Lily breathed in at that. There were tears in her eyes now. Her voice shook even as she started singing too. "Oh mother dear we're not the fortunate ones/And girls, they wanna have fun."

Rose let out a sob before picking it up again, even as Lily joined with the same words. "Oh girls just want to have fun. Oh girls, they just wanna have fun!"

There were no more words. There didn't need to be. The sisters sang on in their minds while Lily dropped into Rose's waiting arms. Sobbing became laughter and became sobbing again as they held each other close, two loving sisters reunited when neither ever expected it again.

Leo couldn't keep the tears from his own eyes. As it turned out, the telepaths were even more susceptible to the joy washing over them.

He glanced Richmond's way. Her expression was controlled but her green eyes made it clear she wasn't unmoved.

A single, gratifying thought came to him. It looks like Rose got her sister back after all.

Ship's Log: 18 December 2643 AST; ASV Aurora. Captain Kaveri Varma recording. The last holdouts of Security Minister Marias' coup forces have surrendered to the Earth Union government. It would seem many of the offices and branches of Marias' agency remained on the fence until the government survived the initial attack, allowing for a quick resolution to the crisis. None of the aid workers scattered across the world were harmed.

The Reformist governments have pledged continued membership in the Union in the aftermath of the failed coup. Their leadership is in negotiations for a variety of reforms that will put the Union on a path away from authoritarianism.

As for the plague, the efforts of the fleet's medical section have seen a vaccine successfully developed. It is being provided now to communities around the Southeast of North America and other possible infection sites. Dr. Diptheek believes a counter-virus should be available shortly that will reverse the condition in those already infected.

Our efforts to learn more about the NEUROM operations have not gone as smoothly.

The young man's face was twisted into a snarl. Meridina and Doctor Tusana were seated in front of him with Commander RIchmond. The Spencers and Kusko were to their right and Walter Smith and Irma Michaels to their left. Kaveri and Robert were behind them with Kaveri's adjutant Bet'tir at her side as always.

"Hab-Kuzad is dead, and your camp's leaders rejected him," said Tusana, her Gersallian lilt speaking lightly and carefully. "There is nothing gained by obstinance."

"Just tell them what they want to know, Mister Tanner," Walter insisted. "We could get you amnesty when we show the Unies you were programmed."

"Amnesty?" Tanner spat at him. "That is what I think of your amnesty, traitor. We may have been stopped now, but espers will rule this world," the man insisted. "When the Ministry of Fate governs and NEUROM rules, traitors like you will suffer the wrath of the Fates. The mutes will be put in their proper place. And my brethren and I will have places of honor in the All-Father's order."

"The Alliance won't permit NEUROM to take this planet like that," Robert said. "We've stopped your plague and we'll help them find other agents. There's no reason to keep fighting for them."

"Stay to your own place, Forceful!" Tanner shook his head. "The only way for espers to survive is to rule mutes completely. We were meant to be Kings. That's what Fate's decreed. Our victory is inevitable."

"Why are you talking like this?" asked Irma. "Calling people 'mutes' and talking about Fate like it's God or something? And what's this about espers?"

"It's how people from S0T5 refer to telepaths," Robert explained. "They call them espers, and a word for non-telepaths is 'mute'." He stepped forward and reached through the Flow of Life for Tanner. Tanner let out a hiss and struck at his mind, but he used his powers to stop the attack. "His very nature's been twisted. Some kind of mental programming? It reminds me a little of what I sensed in Saren, but it's not nearly the same thing as Reaper indoctrination." He remembered that innate twisting he'd felt in Saren and those Salarians on Virmire. It wasn't what he felt here, but there was something fundamental about Tanner's mind that was out of place. Something in his presence in the Flow of Life was innately shifted.

Tanner's reaction was to attack again. This time the other telepaths stepped in. Meridina and Tusana blocked the attack and the Spencers slipped through his defenses with attack probes. Abigail rendered him unconscious while Thomas started sifting through his memories. Walter and Tusana joined him.

"There is something peculiar in his thoughts," said Tusana.

"I sensed this in Hab-Kuzad's mind." Walter shook his head. "It isn't gibberish but I don't know what it is.."

Thomas spoke. "I've never seen anything like this. Bet'tir? Anything?" He asked the Dilgar. There's an order to it but I can't figure out what it is. Maybe the Mha'dorn has seen something we haven't.

The Dilgar also took a look. Peering through Tanner's mind and rifling through the memories to find a baseline, something that would be easy to interpret, the first real concrete memory Tanner had was the easiest one, blowing out the candles on his third birthday. But it was off somehow, even for a human mind it was just ever so slightly out of sync. She looked at other psychologically foundational memories and they were anomalous too. Then she got it.

"It's like a mathematical transformation. All the information is there but it's been shifted around and mapped differently. All roads lead to NEUROM. It's so pervasive you can't disentangle them all without a complete mind-wipe or figuring out exactly what was done. Something like it was tried during The War as part of Len'char's counter-intelligence efforts…" Both Thomas and Abigail knew what that meant. Spectacular levels of evil and incompetence.

"So, Bet'tir, what you're saying is, we're going to need a protracted research effort to figure out how to deprogram these people."

"Yes, that is an accurate summation." Bet'tir answered. "There is a good chance that the necessary work will not pass a Psi Corps Institutional Review Board."

Robert shook his head in disgust, but even that paled to the sheer uncomprehending horror that Meridina and Tusana shared. This went far beyond even the worst their people imagined as an abuse of telepathy. This was the warping of a mind, a living being, into another shape.

"And fixing it to restore the willing-victims… will likely require us to do the same, only in reverse. In the mean-time, their plans are not as concealed as all that. Memory vaults, but not encrypted inside other memories." Thomas wasn't happy about that first part, but it was a job for Sigma and the Mha'dorn. Maybe the Gersallians if they could stomach it. "We can crack them, give us a minute."

A vaulted memory was simply a memory that had its patterns of association cut, so one couldn't reach it from other thoughts. Encrypting memories hid them inside the structure of other memories. An alert telepath could detect a vault with a naive deep scan, not so with encryption. Once detected, a vault was easy to crack open, and it took Thomas all of a minute sort through the contents.

"Hm. Not as blood-thirsty as we initially thought. They were planning on forcing a new civil war, and making the Reformist states dependent on them to fight off their enemies and the plague. Nominally independent when the dust settles, but completely dominated by NEUROM indoctrinated telepaths."

"They must have anticipated our eventual arrival," Meridina said. "But we arrived earlier than they planned."

"Thanks to Becca bat Gurion," Robert mused aloud. "Undone by another telepath."

"We're going to have to pass this up the chain." Kusko said. "I can't imagine they aren't pulling strings in the Earth Alliance. If they aren't now, they soon will be."

"I'll add this to my next report to our government as well." Robert fought down the anger he felt at this. If it's not the Aristos getting off on torturing people, it's NEUROM brainwashing them. He noticed the intent look of Meridina, who didn't need to say or project anything to show her worry at the anger he was feeling. He tried to reassure her by relaxing the look on his face and focusing himself on the Flow of Life around them. The last thing I need is to end up like Hawk.

"The nice thing about just being a telepath is that we can just be pissed without the universe being disappointed in us and turning us into monsters." Dr. Spencer smirked. "But don't worry too much about us. Forewarned is forearmed!" There was a propaganda poster about that somewhere. "If you manage to capture more agents, we'll take them." IRB or no, the deprogramming work was absolutely necessary. "Speaking of which, Rose and Lily. We're prepared to offer them asylum."

Robert nodded. "Leo offered them the same thing on my behalf."

Tusana smiled softly at Thomas. "You did good work in restoring her memories as you have. I have built upon it by helping her rebuild some of the missing association paths. For her emotional well-being the memories of her imprisonment are currently vaulted until she is ready to open them."

"Thank you. For all of it really. There are certain drugs that can be used to help process those memories without being triggered by them. So she'll have excellent post-acute care." He was referring of course to MDMA.

"We have similar drugs, although our preference is for farisa therapists to aid the victim in processing the memories with emotional support."

"They would both face serious charges from Earth authorities," Kaveri said, bringing them back to the subject. "The local government may have fought off an authoritarian coup, but I would fear for the elder Williams' life if she ends up in their custody."

"Treason for Rose, Terrorism for Lily, yes." Kusko had checked the relevant laws.

"That's why Leo had Richmond keep them on the Brahmaputra when it came back," Robert said. "The Williams are aboard now, he's got them in spare medical assistance quarters on Deck 12."

With Captain Varma there, Kusko was reminded of something. "Before I forget, Captain Varma, when I got my marching orders I was instructed to give you this should I see you."

"Oh?" Kaveri looked at her somewhat intrigued. Kusko reached into one of the pockets inside her uniform coat and pulled out a small box and an envelope sealed in wax.

"Fowler regrets not being able to make the wedding." She handed them over. Kaveri pulled out a small blade to open the envelope and read the contents. Both a congratulatory card in bright flashy colors and a letter written in a script so precise that it might as well have been printed by a machine. Then she opened the box with a soft smile and closed it up again.

"Oh gods, that old warhorse is far too kind. Thank you Ms Al, if you could convey to him my thanks and sincere affection?" Which was definitely there, purposefully allowed to leak through the Captain's habitual internal mantra.

"Of course Captain."

It was still the late afternoon when the party from the Aurora arrived at the telepath camp. Robert and Gina were personally escorting Deputy Secretary Crawford and members of his staff. They materialized in the camp commons.

Leo was there, waiting for Nysha and her fellow councillors. The Spencers were beside them.

Before he could begin introductions, Crawford stepped forward with a big grin on his face. His hand came up. "Nice to meet you folks," he said in his most charming drawl. "I'm Deputy Secretary Travis Crawford, Alliance Foreign Office, and I've been dyin' to see how you folks have been getting along."

His mind wasn't singing anything, or showing any signs of anything but just outwardly presenting a gregarious form of charm. Nysha grinned at the sincerity she felt and accepted the hand. "Chairwoman Nysha Williams, sir. Welcome to the Atlanta Telepath Settlement."

Crawford took in the place and nodded. "Still gettin' things back to normal around here, I can see. I hope our people can help you out with that, get you some homes set up real soon."

"That would be good, Mister Secretary. Living in tents gets old after a while."

"Oh, I reckon it does!" He gestured to his sides. "Captain Dale and his nice young lady Miss Inviere saved our hides in Brussels, and he wanted to meet you folks too."

Robert introduced himself formally and did so with Gina. As he spoke, he briefly looked toward the Spencers with some concern at what he was sensing from them.

Through that entire exchange, both the Spencer twins looked ever so slightly stricken and pale. In their minds it was like they were seeing a ghost. But not just any ghost, some sort of Hitlerian poltergeist. They cleared it quickly as soon as attention was turned on them and logic reasserted itself.

Crawford offered his hand, the same warm smile on his face. "Well now, the folks from the Jenny Winters Foundation, right? I hear you were a big help with this terrible plague situation, and that nasty fellow tryin' to stop us from curin' it."

"Um. Yes. " Abigail accepted his hand in her own gloved one. "And it was a pleasure to do that, fascism has no place in all of existence. I'm… I'm sorry Mr. Secretary I don't generally find myself at a loss for words."

"She really doesn't." Kusko was giving her the strangest of looks.

"But, and I know this might seem crazy… You're not a Mississippi Crawford, are you? Related to one Lee Crawford?"

Crawford furrowed his brow for a moment. "Well, I sure am. I'm from Texas myself, out near Tyler, but Lee Crawford of Mississippi was my great-grandpappy. He was one of the first warp-flight astronauts, took the Trailblazer out to Tau Ceti in his day. I'm guessin' he existed in your history too?"

"He wrote the Crawford-Tokash Act. And… the resemblance is uncanny." She shook her head, put somewhat at ease. "I'll admit when you walked in the experience was more than a bit surreal."

"Well now, didn't intend to give you folks a start." Crawford's smile faded into a somber look, and Robert felt some unease in him. "The Crawford-Tokash Act. I read up on that. Terrible law. Written by an unkind man. I guess I now know why great-grandma took my grandpappy and his sisters and hightailed it home to Texas."

"Not your fault, there's no need to apologize for it's just, well, I guess no matter how many universes there are, the world is still small." Thomas interjected.

"It sure can be," Crawford said. "Well, we've got the folks in Brussels reconsiderin' their laws about telepaths, maybe we'll get EarthDome to do the same one day. The way I see it, you folks should be as free as any one else on God's green earth, mind-readin' or not."

They both grinned. "Yeah, maybe one day." Abigail said, but her voice said 'soon' in a completely deniable way "Not that I'm able to comment on Earth Alliance policy, of course."

Given the Secretary's time was as valuable as her own, Nysha spoke up. "Is there anything you'd like to see first, Mister Secretary?"

"I hear you've still got folk recoverin' from that attack," he said. "If they're willin', I'd like to shake their hands and wish them well."

After Leo nodded in approval on the idea, and the fact there were people able to receive visitors, Nysha said, "This way then, Mister Secretary."

As they walked on, Robert took the time to shake the Spencers' hands as well. Thanks for helping my friend, he thought, the image in his head clearly on Leo. And give my regards to Dr. Meier and his husband Mister Hendricks. I can't always keep in touch.

The entire central committee will be getting a briefing and we'll make sure to include that. Thomas replied.

Robert walked on, picking up his pace to catch up with the group. As he moved along, he could hear Thomas humming a familiar tune. I guess they have the Twilight Zone too, he thought to himself.

Abigail p'cast a reply. Oh yes! But not enough to prepare us for that. I'm going to put in a note to revise the curriculum.

His reply was a low chuckle.