News of the Bombay’s destruction had reached him less than ten minutes earlier, courtesy of a private comm from Vanguard’s commanding officer. The message had awoken Kirk from a deep sleep. Even to the captain’s dream-fogged eyes, Reyes had looked stricken, as if someone had bled him pale.

Without preamble, he’d said to Kirk, “The Starship Bombay was destroyed just over eleven hours ago.” The commodore had swallowed hard, apparently strained by the effort of keeping his emotions in check. “One of your officers had family on the Bombay,” he’d continued. “Lieutenant Oriana D’Amato, helm officer, was married to your senior geologist, Lieutenant Robert D’Amato.”

Kirk had thanked Reyes for alerting him before disseminating the news stationwide. Standing in front of the door to D’Amato’s quarters, he no longer felt thankful. He dreaded breaking this kind of news. During his years coming up through the ranks, he had dealt more than once with the trauma of losing personnel under his command. His first year in the captain’s chair, aboard the Enterprise, had only increased that burden. Recording condolences for the families of people like Lee Kelso, or Elizabeth Dehner, or Gary Mitchell, had proved emotionally taxing in the extreme. Until now, however, he’d at least had the buffer of time and distance, and of speaking to people who were, essentially, strangers.

Tonight he would have to look one of his own crewmen in the eye and be the bearer of tragic news. Then he would have to endure the aftermath, whatever it turned out to be. Drawing a deep breath, he calmed himself. This is my responsibility, he reminded himself. D’Amato is one of my crew. If he has to hear this, it should be from me.

He pressed the door buzzer. And he waited.

Several seconds later the door hissed open, revealing the barefoot D’Amato. His dark blue robe hung open, showing his bare chest and loose, gray pajama pants. Squinting at the light, he sounded as groggy as he looked. “Captain?”

“Mr. D’Amato. Sorry to wake you.”

“That’s all right, sir. What can I do for you?”

Gesturing through the door, Kirk said, “May I come in?”

D’Amato stepped aside and ushered the captain in. “Of course, sir. My apologies.”

“No need.” Kirk walked in and stopped in front of a low, padded chair, which faced another one just like it, against the wall on the other side of a low table. As the door closed, D’Amato faded up the lights. Moving to the closer of the two seats, Kirk motioned to D’Amato to take the other one.

With an understandable degree of apprehension, D’Amato settled into the chair. “What brings you here, Captain?”

Words abandoned Kirk for a moment, then he recovered his composure. “I have some bad news,” he said. “In a few minutes, Vanguard’s CO will be making an announcement, but I wanted you to hear this from me.” He paused, drew a small breath, then continued. “Roughly eleven hours ago, your wife’s ship, the Bombay, was destroyed.”

D’Amato’s face looked frozen. He didn’t blink, he seemed barely even to be breathing. Then his Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed once, slowly and deliberately. “Lifeboats?”

“They would have radioed for help,” Kirk said.

Dismay began to alter D’Amato’s features. His brow lifted into a steady crease of alarm, and his eyes grew wide. The tide of his breathing became rapid and shallow, and within seconds he was gasping weakly through his mouth, which drooped open. Turning his head finally enabled him to break eye contact with Kirk. “Was there a planet? Maybe they…maybe they beamed down.”

“They were bringing supplies to a research outpost. If they were going to beam down, that’s where they’d have gone.” Before D’Amato could latch on to this fragment of hope, Kirk added, “But Vanguard’s lost contact with the outpost, too.” D’Amato covered his eyes with one hand. See no evil, Kirk thought. If only it were that easy. “Is there anyone back home you want me to contact for you?”

Still hiding his eyes, D’Amato shook his head. Inhaling sharply through his gritted teeth left him unable to speak.

Kirk wondered why they didn’t teach classes at the Academy about situations like this. They teach us all about machines and tactics and regulations, he ruminated. Would it have hurt to teach us how to talk to people? He leaned forward. “Whatever you need, just ask. Leave of absence, a transfer planetside—”

“I put in for a transfer last month,” D’Amato said, his voice choking. He lowered his hand from his eyes. “So did Oriana. Home was going to be wherever we ended up.” Despondently eyeing his quarters, he added, “Not much point leaving now, I guess…. One empty place is pretty much the same as another.”

Nodding, Kirk thought of the latest empty space in his own life, the one where his best friend Gary Mitchell used to be.

“I’m sorry, Robert,” Kirk said. “Sorry that there’s nothing I can say to make this hurt any less, or stop hurting any sooner…if it ever does. I can’t even say that I know what you’re going through, because I don’t. But as your captain, and as a friend, I’ll be available if you need me, and I’ll do whatever I can to help you get through this. I promise.”

The gesture of support seemed to draw an even more powerful wave of grief out of D’Amato. As valiantly as he struggled to hang on to his dignity, streams of tears crossed one another’s paths as they meandered down his face. “Thanks, Captain.”

Kirk reached across the table and offered D’Amato his hand. The geologist reciprocated, and Kirk clasped his hand firmly around D’Amato’s, as if they were about to arm-wrestle above the table. “It’s going to be okay,” Kirk said. “Maybe not any day soon, but someday.”

“I know that’s true. But it doesn’t feel true.”

“No, it doesn’t.” He gave D’Amato’s hand a final squeeze, then let go. He couldn’t think of anything else to say. To Kirk’s relief, before the awkward silence became uncomfortable D’Amato ended the visit with a simple declaration.

“I’d like to be alone now, sir.”

Vanguard, on its best days, wasn’t what Cervantes Quinn would call a “festive locale.” Naturally, then, he took little note of the dour mood that lay like a shroud over Chief Ivan Vumelko, the Starfleet customs officer who greeted him and the Rocinante in its remote, deep-lower-decks hangar bay. It rang of business as usual.

The paunchy, bug-eyed man scribbled glumly on his log sheet. “What’s your cargo?”

“Don’t have any,” Quinn said.

A suspicious stare. “No cargo?” Vumelko eyed the Rocinante, then cast his leery gaze back at Quinn. “You left two weeks ago—without any cargo, then, either.”

“I went for a joyride.” Affecting a deadpan delivery through a mishmash Texas-Alabama-Louisiana drawl wasn’t easy, but Quinn made it sound like it was.

“That’s a good way to go bankrupt,” Vumelko said.

“It’s one way. I know quite a few.”

“I’ll bet you do.” Vumelko ducked and walked under the nose of the Rocinante, then turned and headed toward the gangway into its aft compartment.

“Hang on, there,” Quinn said. “What do you—”

“Snap inspection,” he said. “Checking for contraband.”

Quinn was going to argue about it, but then he remembered that his cargo hold was emptier than a Tellarite etiquette manual. “Suit yourself,” he said. “I’ll be in the bar if you need me.” He started walking toward the hangar-bay door when it swished open, and a pair of armed Starfleet security guards stepped inside and blocked his exit. He smiled at the two familiar-looking men. “You’re slowin’ down, gents!” He pointed at the floor behind him, then held up three fingers. “Three whole steps! Time to lay off the Tarkalian ale, Chuck.”

“Just sit tight a minute,” said Lieutenant Charles.

Tapping his foot with impatience, Quinn counted away the minutes while Vumelko rooted around inside his ship. Amid the shuffle of empty crates and the hydraulic whispers of cargo panels sliding open and shut, a sudden loud crashing of heavy metallic objects echoed inside the ship, accompanied by a rage-inspired string of compoundly modified profanities.