The Dark Imbalance Read Online Free Page A

compromised, threatened. If, somehow, you were to—>
    “Another hail,” Kajic interrupted the voice only Roche could hear. “Another new one, I mean.”
    She shook her head. “Who now?”
    “Assistant Vice Primate Rey Nemeth of the Second Ju Mandate, according to his ID.”
    “I don’t recognize the name.” She glanced about the bridge; no one volunteered anything. “I suppose he’s following us, too?”
    “No. He’s coming in on a relay.”
    “Ignore him, then. Now—” She stopped herself in time and subvocalized:
    
    She took that as a sign that, at least in the Box’s eyes, she wasn’t doing anything outrageously wrong. That made a nice change.
    “Uri, ignore further hails, unless you think it’s something particularly important. We’ve got better things to do than listen to other peoples’ grievances.”
    Haid grinned wryly. “You figure we have so many enemies already that making a few more won’t make much difference?”
    “That, and I’m loath to believe anyone at the moment. If, as we think, the clone warriors are interested in infiltrating and stirring up dissent, then they could be anywhere. Who’s to say which complaint is legitimate and which a trap? I’d prefer not to take the risk either way. And anyway, it’ll be easier for us to keep dodging than it will be for someone to catch us, no matter how many of them there are.”
    Cane nodded. “True.”
    Roche turned to face him. “And while Uri, Maii, and Ameidio see to that, maybe you and I should take the opportunity to have a private talk.”
    Cane shrugged. “Whatever you say, Morgan.”
    “Good.” Roche stood. “I like the sound of that.”

    * * *

    In the small room at the rear of the bridge, Roche sat in a chair opposite the large hologram emplacement where Uri Kajic had once projected his image. On a display she studied a detailed image of Sol System composited from old map records and incoming data. She had lost count of the number of ships they’d passed since leaving the anchor point, but the Box estimated that around seven hundred Castes were represented in various forms—from the fringe-lovers out where a comet cloud might once have once been to the hot-bloods in close. The sun had seen better days; there was evidence of large-scale waste-dumping in its outer atmosphere—unsurprising, she thought; it had to go somewhere— but thankfully no one had tried any tricks such as the Kesh had in Palasian System. One system utterly destroyed in a month was more than enough for the region.
    Not that there was much to lose. Discounting the ships, the system was mostly empty. There was a faint but well-defined ring around the sun, approximately half a million kilometers in width and less than a thousand thick, just straddling the regions that might have been mundane-habitable had there been a planet to live on. Apart from the ring and the ships, the system contained nothing but vacuum. Anything larger than a pebble had been stripped back to molecules long ago, leaving behind only a wisp of smoke around the system’s star.
    If the system had ever been inhabited—let alone the birthplace of Humanity, as a few scholars had once suggested—nothing remained to show it.
    Roche watched the endlessly chaotic dance of ships for a long moment, wondering who was in them and what they wanted. Then she turned to Cane.
    He sat opposite her, his expression unreadable. The overhead light reflecting off his scalp made it look as if he had a third eye.
    Appropriate, she thought.
    “You wanted to talk to me,” he prompted.
    She paused, wondering, then asked: “Are you reading my mind?”
    “Why do you ask that?”
    “Just answer me, Cane.”
    “No,” he said. “I’m not reading your mind.”
    “Could you, if you wanted to?”
    He frowned. “Morgan, why are you asking me these