Ra-Havreii was surprised when Melora came to see him in engineering. “Commander,” he said with wary civility.

“Commander,” she replied. “I, ah, need your help.” His brow rose, and she continued. “Cethente and Kesi have developed a particle field that can neutralize the disruptive charge in the asteroid dust. We’ve exposed samples of the dust to the field and achieved a total dissipation of the stored energy.”

“Excellent,” he said. “What’s the problem?”

“Deployment. Titan’s main deflector can project the field from orbit to deal with the dust in the stratosphere, but reaching the deep ocean is another matter.”

“Yes, I see,” he said, speaking over her last word. “The most practical way would be to replicate a series of deep-sea probes that can descend to the dynamo layer and permeate it with the field. The techniques we used on Cethente’s pod should serve to protect them from the pressure.”

Melora stared. “But that would take hundreds of thousands of probes. The dynamo layer has a volume of over thirty billion cubic kilometers, and the field can only penetrate so much water!”

“The probes can move through the dynamo layer, each one covering a fair swath over time.”

“But they might only last a few hours each at those pressures.”

“Yes, we’d need redundancy. But we could make do with maybe a thousand. The industrial replicators should be up to it. And we can always harvest the asteroid field for extra raw materials.”

“Deploying a thousand probes would take every available hand we could spare! It’d take days!”

“Have you got a pressing appointment somewhere else? I’m sure Commander Vale would be happy to leave this world to its doom so you don’t have to be inconvenienced.”

Her gaze hardened. “Oh, don’t start with me now, Xin. This isn’t the time.”

“ Iam being entirely professional. Unlike you, we Efrosians have the knack for objectivity toward our sexual liaisons.”

“Says the man who said he loved me!”

Everyone close enough to hear—meaning everyone in engineering, for she had said it rather loudly—turned to stare at them. Refusing to acknowledge their distraction, Ra-Havreii pulled the Elaysian into his office, her light build and antigrav suit making her almost weightless. She didn’t resist, though. Once they were in private, he pointed angrily and opened his mouth. “I—”

After a moment, she crossed her arms. “You?”

“Well, you said it too.”

“I did.”

“It was the heat of the moment. The distress. Look, we really should get back to these probes—”

“Xin, what are you so afraid of?”

There was no hostility in it. Her emotional armor fell before his eyes. This proud, defensive woman had left herself vulnerable to him by choice. In response, he felt his own guard falling away. “Isn’t it obvious?” he said.

“That we love each other?”

“Yes! I—I never expected that to happen. I don’t know how to deal with it. I’m not ready for…for that.”

She frowned. “For what, Xin? I thought Efrosian men didn’t form commitments.”

“Well, no, it’s—Just because we don’t pair-bond for child-rearing doesn’t mean we don’t form emotional bonds. We just consider them something separate from parenting. An Efrosian female has the support of her entire community in raising her children. That can include male lovers, although generally not the seed donor.” He shrugged. “Our society evolved in difficult conditions, with a limited population. That made it necessary for males to father each child with a different mate, to maximize gene pool diversity. It’s a matter of necessity. It doesn’t mean we’re incapable of emotional commitment.”

Melora was silent for a time. “So are you saying…you want to commit with me?”

“No! I mean…I don’t know. Don’t you?”

“Is that what you think?”

“You said you love me.”

“I do.”

“And your people…you docommit.”

“Usually,” she confirmed.

He tried to think of something clever to say, but all that came out was, “I’m afraid to. I don’t think I’m ready.”

Melora took his hand and smiled. “What makes you think I am?”

His eyes widened. “But…what we said…”

She nodded. “I love you. You love me. Isn’t that enough?” She moved closer. “We’ve been fighting because we’ve both been afraid of the same thing: that being in love meant having to escalate things, to make a commitment. But why mess with a good thing? If we’re both happy just…being together, having good times together, then why can’t that be what love means to us?” She kissed him. “This ship is all about embracing different ways of living and being. So why force ourselves to conform to some set of expectations about what being in love requires? Let’s make it what wewant it to be.”

He thought it over for a few moments, then nodded. “All right. Let’s do that.” He felt relief wash over him. They were comfortable together again, and that was what he wanted most of all.

“Great.” She smiled. “I love you, Xin.”

He kissed her, taking his time. “I love you, Melora.”

After a moment, he let her go, fidgeting a bit. “I…suppose we should get back to work on those probes.”

She blinked a few times and cleared her throat. “Uhh, right. Right behind you.”