Tolan sighed heavily as he leafed through the pages of the large leather folder. He found himself glancing at the child sitting opposite him across the table. Diabolique sat, her legs swaying idly to and fro, her fingers tracing the patterns in the wood of the table.
"Do you know what this is?" Tolan asked softly as he laid the folder open between them.
"A treaty. Well, many treaties for the many worlds surrounding the twin suns," Diabolique answered just as softly as she looked down, then up to Tolan. "But...why are some of the treaties already signed?" she asked.
"Ah, well..." Tolan paused as he pondered what to tell the child before him. With a deep breath he finally decided upon the truth - it seemed about the right time anyway.
"You are not the first to become gifted with a genetic knowledge," Tolan began as he watched Diabolique's red eyes widen in shock. "There were two others, two males, older then you when they came here by a few years at least. They were given the same gift, though I doubt very much they had as much advancement."
Tolan watched as she nodded silently.
"They too were sent with that same task, as you can see they were able to get a planet for two to sign, but eventually one did not and so..."
Tolan trailed off as he sighed heavily his eyes filled with unshed tears.
"What happened, Tolan?"
Licking his lips, Tolan took a deep breath as he turned to an unsigned treaty.
"They were banished. To where I know not, just that Karl gathered us into the great hall, he then made us watch as a portal, the very same portal we all arrived in was created and they were pushed into it. Karl said... Karl said they would not live past a year on whatever gods-forsaken planet they were banished to."
Swiping the tears away Tolan looked to Diabolique as she sighed heavily.
"Are they alive?"
"I don't know. Maybe."
"Well I'd better not fail," Diabolique muttered as she pulled the folder towards herself and began to study the planets one by one.
"I knew it"
It was late in the evening. Haven was almost silent apart from the sound of the water greeting the sand outside the window. Tolan looked to Mia as she huffed.
"I just knew it," she repeated, leaving a bemused Tolan sitting nursing a glass of elder wine, watching the small group who had joined in the kitchen.
"Well, nothing we can do about it apart form make sure she's trained," Tolan muttered as he looked to the group. Heads nodded silently as a silence descended.
Minutes turned to hours, hours to days, days turned to weeks and eventually weeks into months. Soon, four months had passed. Four long months of training, teaching, and learning.
The most surprising thing was that less than a month after Karl's announcement, Latro led Diabolique towards a grassed dune just east of Haven itself. As they reached the top, Diabolique found herself silently looking down in shock.
"Is that what I think it is?" Diabolique found herself asking as she looked up to Latro. The Hirogen smiled slightly as he led the child down the small path towards a landing pad, for there stood a space ship!
"It is a Hirogen Venatic Dreadnought," Latro explained as he led the way down the path in front of the spacecraft. They found themselves studying the craft - more herself then Latro - for then Diabolique watched as the Hirogen ran his hand along the hull of the craft with lidded eyes, as though remembering something.
"She was yours, wasn't she?" Diabolique asked softly. Latro seemed to click back into the present.
"My father's, though I learnt to fly her for a time. She is now yours," Latro declared bluntly.
"Why?"
"Because you will need to get to other planets, will you not?" Latro reasoned as he watched Diabolique sigh softly as though accepting the inevitable.
"I suppose. Will you teach me to fly her?" Diabolique asked as she looked over to the taller hunter. He nodded slightly, it seemed things were changing once again and not for the better.
Mia watched with both hands either covering her eyes, mouth or ears, Tolan glanced with bemusement, thinking of the see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil monkeys. Yet she did not once see the look in Tolan's eyes, which spoke volumes!
The Hirogen Venatic Dreadnought spacecraft, which Diabolique had aptly named the "Talux", glided, dived, swerved, boosted and danced in the sky of Tullan itself. Latro sat in the commanding seat, next to the child who was now controlling the thing. He seemed impressed - the child was a natural, which was a shock considering the said child was from the 20th century. Latro sat there watching as with unspoken skill the child's young fingers ghosted over the controls before her. He thought back to what Mia had said mere days ago. "The child would have joined what 20th century Britain called the Royal Air Force if she wasn't here." And yet Latro did wonder about that. What would the life of this child have been like? But that was all he could do, wonder and hope that the coming days would be better. Though he very much doubted it.