Chapter 9
General Occana led the way out of the science block so that the experts could look at the Karaak bodies and the Skelg in peace. I grimaced again as we passed the eel-like creature on the way out. I swept my gaze over the scientists who poked and prodded and took samples from the creature, and I felt a pang of sympathy for the strange snake. Even in death, it wasn’t left alone.
But I also knew that without all the testing, the Lilacrons would have no chance against the Karaak, and I wouldn’t be able to learn more about them before they inevitably headed for Earth. But the advancements that Hemphy had already made in such a short period of time were astounding, and I was sure he wasn’t done pulling rabbits out of hats. He was one of the most intelligent beings I’d ever met, and I was stunned by what he and his team had been able to glean from the Karaak ship we had brought them. Now, if he could just find the Karaak’s kryptonite, that would be great.
I was pulled out of my thoughts when we re-emerged into the main section of the colony. The Lilacrons that we passed allowed us space to pass by, but I could feel every one of their eyes on the back of my head. I could understand why, of course.
Some mysterious alien they had never met had turned up at their safehouse with an enemy ship in tow and had tried to help them out for seemingly no reason. The fact that they stared at me like a zoo animal wasn’t exactly a surprise, but I had never been all that comfortable in the spotlight.
I also knew that rumors spread fast, so news of our arrival had probably spread to even the furthest corners of the colony. I just hoped that some other bit of gossip would occupy the Lilacrons soon, just so I wouldn’t have to feel their stares anymore.
Still, I didn’t want to come across as an ogre, so I smiled politely as we passed and even waved at a small group of kids who watched us with wide eyes. I was getting pretty good at reading Lilacron faces, so I could tell that most of the people we saw were curious or even supportive of our efforts, which hopefully meant no pitchforks at our door in the middle of the night.
“You’ve been in the Main Operations room,” Occana said and gestured to a set of cream doors.
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s where we met everyone when we first arrived.”
“And where we saw the scout ship when it arrived,” Rayne added as she nodded to a pair of women who were watching us.
“Well, it hasn’t changed since then,” he chuckled. “Except for some of the people, of course. I don’t think there’s any need to revisit it, and I would like you to see more of what I would consider to be the true Lilacron culture.”
“I hadn’t realized this place was so big,” I said. “I thought we’d seen almost everything. The science block, the main ops room, the cells, and the sleeping quarters. What else is there?”
Occana gave me an amused look and then turned down a corridor we hadn’t been down before.
“We aren’t just surviving,” he said. “We are trying to save our culture. So yes, there is a great deal more than just the areas you have seen.”
I had just assumed that there were just more bedrooms in this section, but I realized I hadn’t really based that on anything other than the similarity to the hallway where we’d spent the night. I tried to guesstimate just how big this place was and decided that I’d seriously underestimated its true size.
The first section we came across was the infirmary, and when I saw it, I felt like an arrow had just been shot into my heart. We stepped into the doorway, and immediately, I was almost trampled by a group of Lilacrons that I assumed were doctors rushing past with a bed on wheels grasped between them. The patient on it was covered in purple blood.
And there was a lot of blood. It poured out of the Lilacron’s mouth as the alien vomited all over the bed, and I noted the blotches all over their pale skin that looked to me like an infection. The sick Lilacron also had a large gash on the side that had been sewn up, but it was leaking a sort of clear fluid that reminded me of a blister I popped once. We watched the ill alien for a moment, until the bed was rolled through a door to the left.
“Operating theaters,” Francine said through Bob as she translated the sign above the door they went through.
“He looked like they needed one,” I sighed.
“He won’t live through the day,” Occana said coldly, and when he saw the look of surprise on my face, he softened. “It is the reality of the situation we are in, unfortunately. But it doesn’t help anyone to have false hope. We are logical beings. He knows he’s already gone.”
“Then why try?” Rayne asked.
“Because sometimes, someone beats the odds,” Occana said. “And there are so few of us that we have no choice.”
A pall fell over our little group as we watched the other doctors and nurses as they hustled through the ward. There were almost as many AIs at work in the infirmary as there were Lilacron staff, and the robots zipped around with a single-minded doggedness. Some of the AI had mechanical legs, like Bob, while others were propelled along by small fans in their shells. They were all smooth, like Francine’s shell had been when I first found the AI in my backyard, but that was the only similarity I could spot.
“So, were most of the survivors already off-planet when the attacks began?’ Rayne asked in a puzzled voice. “I didn’t think Lilacrons traveled that much.”
“We don’t,” Occana replied. “But we always have enough awake medical staff to handle any emergencies, so many of our medical personnel were able to evacuate. They took as many Lilacrons as they could. The AIs worked to save many of my people as well. Without their help, our numbers would be even smaller. The real challenge now is to save those we can. There are just so many injuries.”
Occana sighed and then led us deeper into the room. There were rows upon rows of beds filled with groaning, bleeding, or unconscious Lilacrons, all of whom were battered or broken in some way. Some of the beds had curtains around them for privacy, but for the most part, the whole horror show was there for anyone to see. The doctors ran from patient to patient, and there was barely enough time for the medics to wrap cuts in medicated bandages or feed medicine to the patients before they had to move on to the next Lilacron. Some of the patients were hooked up to tubes and wires just like the Lilacrons that I had seen in stasis, only these were awake and in pain.
“This is the reality of battling against extinction,” General Occana said. “We are fighting the Karaak to keep our people safe, but a lot of our people are fighting against death to keep our species alive.”
“I had no idea,” I said.
“Some of these people almost died running from our home,” he said. “The Karaak almost killed them. But they made it here, and that has to mean something. It does to me. We are fighters. The fact we have been in stasis for many years might make some think we are weak or unable to fend for ourselves, but that is not the case. We have just been resting until a day like this came.”
“Don’t you wish it would just all go back to how it was?” Rayne asked.
“Of course,” he replied with a sadness in his eyes. “I would give everything to go back, for the Karaak to have never attacked our world. But that can and will never happen. So, now we must push through with what we have.”
I looked over at Rayne and saw her eyes were filled with tears at the awful sight in front of us. I reached out and slid my hand into hers, and though she didn’t look at me, she squeezed my hand. As my mother had always told me, a load shared was a load halved, and when my fingers touched hers, I felt a small amount of the weight lift off my shoulders.
But a part of me was shaken, and though I tried to keep calm, my imagination started to run riot as I pictured the same scene unfolding on Earth. I knew the Kaarak had already added my home to their list, and the Lilacrons were far more technologically advanced than we poor humans. If the Kaarak had done this to the Lilacrons, what chance did humanity have?
One of the patients suddenly cried out in pain, and I cringed even as a pair of nurses ran over. I couldn’t help it, because now all I could see were humans screaming in pain, children screaming for their murdered parents, and dead bodies piled up everywhere. It would be a massacre, and there wasn’t a weapon on Earth that could stop the carnage, nor a bunker deep enough to protect the survivors. The worst we could do was bruise the bastards, and all that would do would be to spur them on to be even more ruthless.
Rayne must have sensed my disquiet, because she squeezed my hand and glanced at me. That simple act was enough to banish the nightmare I’d been caught in, though the vast sea of injured Lilacrons still stretched before us.
“I hope I have not upset you,” Occana said quietly. “But I wanted you to see what the Karaak did with your own eyes. You saw our planet, but now you have seen the true cost of the attack. For an ordinary Lilacron, the attack was beyond comprehension.”
“I’m glad you showed us,” I said with a nod. “It’s given me some perspective. And a warning of what could be.”
“I know you are prepared to defend your home,” Occana replied. “But I need you to understand what you will be facing.”
“Do not be upset, Will,” Francine’s voice said to me alone. “This is why we have come here. To defend my creators and to learn so that you can defend your people.”
“We should get out of their way,” I said as another doctor hurried past us. “If I had any medical training, I’d offer to help, but I’m afraid I’d probably only make things worse.”
“We could bring some supplies later,” Rayne suggested. “I’m sure we have some that we could spare.”
“I’ll consult with our doctors,” Occana replied. “I know there have been shortages of some medicines, but I’m not sure which they need the most.”
“That would be great,” Rayne said and squeezed my hand again.
Occana nodded, and we made our way back out into the corridor. After what we’d just seen, though, the happiness at our success had disappeared. A somber cloud settled over us, and the sound of our footsteps now seemed lonely and depressing.
But I refused to give in to the fear and despair. I started to tell myself that we would fight and we would win, and I felt the flame inside my stomach swell into a full-blown bonfire of determination and hatred toward the Karaak. I was going to beat those sons of bitches, even if it was the last thing I did.
I forced myself to stop dragging my feet, and instead, I started to march along with my head held high. I gave Rayne a wink when she looked at me, and soon, she was proud stepping as well.
“This is part of the original colony,” Occana said as we made another turn.
“It looks older,” I commented.
The panels on the walls were scuffed and had a slightly different shade of cream than the newer sections of the colony. The floor was dull from so many footsteps over the years, and the overhead lights reminded me of old fluorescent lights from the seventies.
As we walked through the original section, I became aware of the sound of air hissing every now and then as well as the low hum of an engine or motor. I frowned slightly, but I couldn’t see anything that would make that sound.
Occana stopped in front of another set of double doors. A hole had been cut in the wall and a thicket of wires had been strung through the hole to the room on the other side. Whatever was on the other side used a lot of power, and even though this was a farming colony, I didn’t think there was any part of the farming process that was so energy heavy.
“I’m guessing weapons,” I whispered to Rayne.
Occana opened the door for us and revealed an enormous room beyond. The place was so brightly lit, that it took a moment for me to figure out what I was looking at.
“It’s a farm,” Rayne gasped.
“One of many,” Occana replied.
The room had a low ceiling crisscrossed by lines of powerful lights. The beams from the lights were strong enough to heat the room like hothouse, which made sense when I saw the endless rows of corn. It must have been about an acre in size, but the Lilacrons had figured out how to cram more corn into that acre than any farm I’d ever seen.
Of course, I knew from Francine that the Lilacrons lived off of corn. When in stasis, they received a corn-based syrup solution through a tube to keep them fed, and when I had gone to Lilacron, that same sticky fluid had been all over the destroyed buildings. I also knew that the Frumentum Colony was created to provide the homeworld with the corn it needed, and although the colony had been taken over to house what was left of their people, they obviously still had to provide food for everyone.
“Damn,” I said as I took it all in.
“We have ten more rooms just like this,” Occana said. “We cannot have our people starving.”
“It’s a lot of crops,” Rayne said. “But how do you make sure you always have enough food to feed everyone? Do you rotate the crops?”
“This corn is not like any you would be familiar with,” Occana replied. “We modified it several generations ago as a way to shorten the growing time. We harvest these every two weeks.”
“Whoa,” Rayne said. “If only we’d had food like this back on Wildern.”
“You didn’t have any food on your planet,” I chuckled. “I don’t remember seeing acres and acres of crops.”
“Fair point,” she laughed. “Other than old canned food and animals, there wasn’t much on offer.”
“And those weird monsters that almost did us in,” I said. “Don’t forget those.”
“We don’t eat those,” she said with a shudder.
Occana took us into a room opposite the farming field, and inside that were a variety of different machines that were slowly turning the farmed corn into syrup and other foodstuffs that would keep the colony alive. I could imagine that eating corn might get a little boring, although I supposed it was like drinking water to humans. Still, they had clearly come up with various different ways of cooking the corn so it kept things interesting, and at least the smell inside the room was sweet and filled my nose with a pleasant aroma, unlike a few meat processing plants I’d visited back home.
It turned out that the purr of engines and hissing of air had come from this room as the different machines that prepared the corn moved in and out, shook, spun, and finally poured the Lilacrons’ food into various containers. There were no Lilacrons in this section of the colony since everything was automated, and the only movement inside the room was a couple of AIs that were posted there just to make sure everything continued to run smoothly.
“Looks like this was a pretty efficient operation,” I said as we moved on again through yet more passages.
“It was an excellent farming colony,” Occana said. “But it needed a lot of alterations done fast when we ran here from Lilacron. And speaking of which, this is why we need to talk to you.”
As we rounded one last corner, the whole place seemed to open up before us. Where we had just been inside a labyrinthine maze of corridors, we were now in a wide, open hallway that had large doors leading off it on either side. It was more of a tunnel and could easily allow a large vehicle to drive down it, and every now and then, one of the Lilacron exited one door and walked into another.
Every person we saw wore protective gear, like gloves or masks, and I realized that they were working on machinery at this end. From what I had experienced already, with their ships and Francine of course, I had a feeling that they were quite the craftsmen. And yet, Occana still needed some help with working out how to best protect the colony, and I was glad to have been brought in on it. The Karaak could come back at any moment, and I needed this place to have a fighting chance if they did because I didn’t know if I’d be able to take out more than one of the enemy ships before they reached this dwarf planet.
We had arrived in front of two doors that ran from the floor to the ceiling and were tall enough to fit a double-decker bus through. There was a sensor above the door that detected our presence, and the two doors split apart and rolled back to reveal another hangar, similar to the one that we were parked in on the other side of the colony.
This one was filled to the brim with spaceships similar to all of the Lilacron ones I had seen, with creamy white exteriors and similar layouts to my ship. And while it wasn’t like they were short of aircraft, the issue was glaringly obvious.
I had seen a ship like these when we had visited The Crossed Swords, and it had been specifically designed for transporting Lilacrons that were in stasis. These weren’t battleships that could fight a war against the Karaak. And yet, this was all the Lilacrons had left aside from a few fighter ships that had survived the attack.
But as I’d already learned, the Lilacrons didn’t give up easily, and I spotted several engineers and mechanics in the hangar that were working on the transport ships. It was clear the plan was to retrofit the ships, but the effort looked haphazard at best. AIs flitted from ship to ship to weld, drill, and attach weapons while the Lilacrons ran around, sometimes to do work, sometimes just to yell contradictory orders at each other.
“I see the problem,” I said. “Too many cooks.”
“Too many cooks?” Occana asked in confusion.
“An old Earth saying,” I explained. “‘Too many cooks spoil the broth’.”
“Ah,” Occana said and nodded. “Yes, I believe that’s true, both in the kitchen and in this hangar. But these are the last of our ships, so we must prepare them for war.”
“Do they have any type of weapons?” I asked as I tried to remember what I could about the ship we’d encountered at the Crossed Swords.
“The weapons they have are mostly defensive,” Occana replied. “Their purpose is primarily to destroy things like meteorites that might cross their path. They aren’t powerful enough to penetrate shields.”
“Upgrading the weapons should be a priority, then,” I said. “What about engines?”
“Same as yours, but slower,” he replied. “They have folding engines, but it takes twenty hours for them to recharge.”
“I see,” I said. “Shields?”
“Basic,” he replied.
“Hmm,” I pondered.
“Well, I would focus on the shields first, if it was me,” Rayne said. “It doesn’t do you any good to improve the weapons if your ships can be destroyed with a single blast.”
“I agree,” I said. “We’ve already seen what the Karaak can do with their weapons. And that acid they spit can burn through an unprotected hull. Once that happens… well, you know how bad it can be.”
“It’s a terrible way to die,” Occana replied. “And shields were my thought as well. But I wasn’t sure if I was just being… sentimental after the loss of so many Lilacrons. It’s good to have you confirm that.”
“Well, I don’t know how fast your teams can work,” I said. “Or how much time we have until the Karaak return, but I like the laser turrets on my ship. It gives you more combat options, especially when you’re battling ships that can move as fast as the Karaak can. Other than that, the tractor beam was pretty useful, as you saw for yourself. But I don’t know where you’re gonna get thousands of those.”
Occana sighed and looked over the room.
“Start with shields and laser turrets,” I repeated. “If you can add a plasma canon in here and there, go for it. Oh, and maybe increase their speed, if possible. That’s my advice.”
“You don’t look hopeful,” Occana said as he read my face.
“It’s just… is this really all we have to protect this colony?” I asked.
“As far as ships go,” he replied. “We’ll probably be weaponizing the farm equipment after this. But we do have another defensive system.”
“Oh, thank God,” Rayne muttered.
“Follow me.” Occana took off again and headed out of the hangar like a man on a mission.
He stopped in front of another doorway, but when the doors slid open, there was only a small elevator on the other side instead of another long hallway. Occana waved us inside, shut the door, and pressed the middle button of only three buttons on the panel. A moment later, the elevator started to descend, but Occana remained stubbornly silent.
“I thought everything was above ground,” I said.
Occana merely shrugged and stared at the door.
The elevator finally stopped, and the doors opened into another corridor that looked almost identical to the one upstairs. For a moment, I wondered if we’d just stood in the box while the doors opened and closed every so often, but as I stepped out into the lower level, it was almost like I could feel the weight of the rock all around me. There was something about being underground that one could just sense, though I couldn’t put my finger on it.
Rayne and I gave one another a surprised glance and then followed Occana toward a door at the end of the hall. Bob plodded along diligently beside me and beeped every so often. He was a glass-half-full soul, even though he technically didn’t have one, and it was hard for his puppy-like energy not to rub off on both of us even a little.
I grinned at the robot and then at Rayne, and she smiled as well.
“Did you know there were more floors?” I asked her.
“I know what you do,” she said. “It makes sense, though, right? I mean, when I saw the colony from a distance for the first time, I did think to myself, ‘is that it?’.”
“Well, it looks like you were right,” I replied.
I noted the pipes and wiring running along the top of the wall to my right. I followed it with my eyes as we walked, but just before we reached the door, the wires and tubes angled downwards and disappeared through the floor.
Jeez, were there even more levels?
Occana had to type in a code into a screen on the wall beside the door, and when it went blue, the door opened for us.
The cavern beyond was dark compared to the rest of the colony, with its cream walls and fluorescent lighting. Gone were the strip lights and bright surroundings. This room was cavernous, and the Lilacrons hadn’t bothered to try and make it look aesthetically pleasing. The walls were jagged from where they had cut into some of the rock, but for the most part, the cavern looked to have been formed naturally. The only light inside it was from dim, warm bulbs mounted on the walls every few meters, but they did nothing to combat the shadows and darkness inside the huge catacomb.
However, it wasn’t the cave itself that had caught my eye, it was what they kept inside it.
A row of five huge cannons were arranged through the middle of the cave, and each of the turrets were pointed up toward the ceiling. Now that I looked closer, I could see that there was a huge square that had been cut into the roof of the cave, and it definitely wasn’t naturally occurring. It was too perfect to be anything other than man-made. Or Lilacron-made.
“This is our main defense,” Occana said. “The roof slides back, and the turrets can fire at anything coming at us from above. There is one more on the other side of the colony.”
“Holy shit,” I said.
“They are old and do not have unlimited ammunition,” the General said. “They take a long time to load, and if a ship is fast, then they are ineffective. The attacker needs to be close to be within range, but once they are, these things are deadly. They will destroy a ship, but the issue is that if the Karaak are close enough, then we will also sustain damage. And I do not think the colony can withstand many blows.”
“Are you getting this, Francine?” I asked.
“Of course,” she replied in my head before she began to speak through Bob. “They are excellent. If a little dated.”
“Thank you… I think,” Occana said. “When we put them in many years ago, we thought they would never be used. In fact, many people considered this a waste of money. Who would attack a farming colony? But there were raiders in the area then, so we added the cannons. And now, here we are.”
“I’m just glad they did it,” Rayne said. “At least it’s something.”
“They do need some work, though,” I said. “As you said, the Karaak ships would have to be ridiculously close to be within range. We’d be destroyed before you could even yell ‘fire’.”
“We were going to move onto these next,” Occana said. “But we have a limited number of engineers that would know how to do this.”
“Can’t you give people uploads?” I asked.
Occana looked surprised for a moment that I knew about that, and then he remembered that Francine and I were partners.
“No,” he said. “We don’t have enough nanotechnology left for everyone, and most people wouldn’t be able to handle it right now. Too many injuries.”
“It is painful,” I said pointedly.
“What’s done cannot be undone,” Francine replied inside my head.
“Don’t start with the quotes,” I chuckled.
“It’s better to ask forgiveness than permission,” the AI said.
“Here we go,” I sighed. “Any more while you’re at it?”
“To be, or not to be?” Francine said in a mischievous tone.
“Very funny,” I replied, and then I became aware of how insane I must have looked to my companions.
I tapped the chestpiece of my suit and pointed to the sliver of Francine’s shell that was always wedged in it, and Occana nodded in understanding.
“For a moment, I was worried we’d have to find someone else to protect us,” he said. “We cannot have a crazy person giving us suggestions on how to help my people.”
“Sorry,” I laughed. “I sometimes forget that no one else can hear Frankie, although you’re probably lucky that you can’t hear her most of the time.”
“Rude,” the AI said, and I smirked at that.
“Why is your AI named Francine?” Occana asked.
“After the first truck I owned,” I replied. “The name had a special place in my heart, and my pilot’s chair is actually the seat from the original Francine. I used to drive trucks for a living on Earth before I retired. I transported goods across the country.”
“I see,” he said. “That is a nice sentiment.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Francine-Bob replied.
“Anyway, back to business,” I said. “You’re short on engineers, I get that. But we need to start work on these cannons as well. It would be a waste to just have them sitting here doing nothing.”
“I can help,” Rayne said. “We could get a couple of engineers down here, and we could all work on them.”
“Actually, I have one more thing that Will needs to see,” Occana said in a weirdly vague tone.
I glanced at him out of curiosity, but his long face was unreadable.
“Alright, then Bob and I will stay here and get started on the cannons,” she said. “Do I have your permission to recruit a couple of engineers and grab some of the tools from upstairs?”
“Of course,” Occana said with a nod. “If anybody gives you a hard time, then use the internal communications system to call me.”’
“Are you sure you want to do that?” I asked.
“Of course,” she replied. “I used to build weapons all the time back home, so this is nothing. Besides, what else am I going to do while you’re off with the General here?”
I thought of the fire-launcher that she’d designed herself, which was one of the coolest weapons I’d ever come across.
“If you wouldn’t mind, we would be grateful,” Occana said.
Rayne nodded warmly. One of her best features had always been her generosity.
Bob beeped affirmatively, and I was sure that if he had known how to give a salute, he would have.
“I will converse with the other AI and have them send some of the engineers down here, along with a few bots,” Francine-Bob said. “That way, Rayne and I can work out a plan while we wait for the engineers to arrive.”
“Don’t forget to tell them to bring their tools,” Rayne said.
“And we will be back shortly,” Occana said.
I gave Rayne a wink, and then I turned and followed Occana out of the cannon cave. We didn’t speak while we got back into the elevator, and when he pressed another button below the level we were on, he noted the deep, puzzled frown on my face.
“Surprised?” he asked.
“I didn’t know this place went any deeper,” I replied.
“That is sort of the point,” he said.
“I guess so,” I chuckled. “It’s certainly a great hiding place.”
Occana looked pleased that I had at least figured that out, and as we dropped deeper toward the dwarf planet’s core, I noticed that this descent had been a hell of a lot longer than the first one had been.
“When we first arrived on this dwarf planet, there were two caves already situated deep underground,” Occana said in a voice that sounded a lot like a dramatized introduction to a movie about cave exploration. “One is the one the cannons are located in, but the other was much larger, and much deeper below ground.”
“And what is it that you keep in there?” I asked.
“Lilacron only had so much space,” he said. “Soon, we became overpopulated, even in stasis.”
“So… you’re saying…” I began, but the doors opened before I could finish my sentence. “Holy shit.”
I was staring at about two hundred Lilacrons lying in stasis inside a vast cave. Each of them was plugged into wires and tubes, and that explained the lines I had seen on the floor above. There were a couple of empty pods, but most of them were occupied by unconscious Lilacrons, and they were arranged around the room in an orderly way. They each emitted a violet glow that made the floor look like it was made of amethyst, and if some guy in a black coat appeared and offered me a choice between two colored pills, I wouldn’t have been all that surprised.
“Were these people already here when the Karaak attacked Lilacron?” I asked.
“Yes,” Occana replied. “They were moved here because of the overcrowding on Lilacron, which, it turns out, was lucky for them.”
“You can say that again,” I said.
“Others weren’t so fortunate,” he said with a distant look in his eyes.
“I’m just going to state the obvious here… Why haven’t you woken them up?” I asked. “Surely you could use the manpower?”
“These are all elders,” he explained. “They are many years old and would not be as much use physically as others could be.”
“So, they have no idea about what’s going on with their people?” I asked.
“No, they know everything,” Occana said. “As a species, we respect those older than us, since they have the wisdom that we have yet to learn.”
“I’d like to say humans are the same, for the most part, but that excludes teenagers,” I replied as I took in all of the tubes and limp bodies. “Do you know any of them?”
“Not closely, but one of them was my mentor when I was young,” Occana said.
“Well…” I said. “I’m glad to know there’s more of your kind… But shouldn’t we get back and help Rayne and the other engineers?”
“Not yet,” Occana said as he walked slowly over to one of the empty pods.
“Why not?” I asked.
“I spoke to my mentor earlier,” he replied as he laid his long fingers on the open stasis tube. “He was alarmed by the situation we are facing, but he was particularly interested in you and what you have done so far. The elders would like to meet you, Will.”