Over the next few days, Titus survived on what H’lim provided, though he sometimes vomited up most of what he swallowed. Mirelle’s improvement was evidence that Abbot wasn’t at her again, not yet.

Abbot was as horrified as Titus that H’lim had eluded them and the guards to bring Titus blood. H’lim argued, “I made sure it was safe enough. Filial duty takes precedence.”

“You could have called me,” Titus repeated doggedly, and H’lim insisted Titus had even less business stalking the halls in such condition than H’lim had, and besides they couldn’t trust the monitored vidcom channels. For Titus it was a new experience, having someone worry about him. In the end, Titus understood that the restrictions were chafing on H’lim, and this had been his way of asserting himself as well as seeking that peculiar gratification Titus had discovered while providing for Abbot. And H’lim hadn’t been caught. He hadn’t made any of the mistakes he’d made the first time. He’d learned a lot about humans.

But after that, Titus, Abbot, and Inea clung closer to H’lim.

Inea, having fewer obligations than the department heads, had the longest duty hours alone with the alien. But he never gave any trouble. They seemed to be developing a kind of friendship as Inea became ever more fascinated with the evolution of the orl and luren.

During this time, two ships penetrated the blockade dropping bundles of supplies near the station. Soon the probe construction was resumed, and rations were increased, though there was no blood aboard for Titus. He understood security must be ferocious, and though his spirits sank, he didn’t blame Cofinie for the failure.

After that single W.S. triumph, the frenzy of the orbital clashes increased. Colby instituted a more vigorous regimen of decompression drills. At rumors that a blockader ship blown up in Earth atmosphere had been slated to bomb Project Station, she ordered more lower levels equipped as survival bunkers.

With the new hardware in place in the probe, programmers began installing the software, both guidance and message. They installed extra shielding on the assumption that the probe would launch through a dense veil of heavy particles. During this phase, Abbot spent much of his time at the probe hangar. When Titus planted one of Inea’s bugs on the vehicle, guards caught him loitering and Colby ordered him not to go out there after his targeting program was in place. “You’re too valuable to lose, and that hangar is the primary target on this station.”

With the installation of Titus’s program, his crew’s job was over. They were exhausted but still tense because they they could have done better, given time. Titus sent them to rest. “You’ve got to be back here on Launch Day, fresh and ready to work. We have to track the probe, probably without backup from Earth.” Every day, news came of another attack on W.S. orbital control installations and even University observatories.

Now it often fell to Titus to escort H’lim at meetings of the joint Cognitive Sciences and Telecom committee that was designing Earth’s message. And one thing stood out, even above the achievement of a broadcast signal intelligible across such a gulf of space and culture: H’lim was gradually winning the humans over. They had begun to trust him. And as that trust grew, the factionalism on the station precipitated by the war began to melt away. There was a feeling that only those on the station had any grasp of what was out there in the galaxy, and of how Earth could benefit from it all.

Titus’s distrust of H’lim, however, was not assuaged by seeing how he manipulated humans without even using Influence-or how he’d learned to do that in such a short time. One other thing bothered Titus: H’lim had no difficulty understanding the war. His strange, backhanded grasp of English never got in the way on that topic. He had the concepts down pat.

After one meeting, H’lim confided, “Now I’m glad Abbot’s sending a real message, or I’d have been tempted to deceive the humans. They’re clever, Titus. Especially Mirelle. They’d have caught me.” Seeing Titus’s expression, he’d added, “I’m sorry you and Abbot are at odds over this.”

It was one of the few times Titus believed the luren. He pressed him. “What exactly did you put in Abbot’s message that’s not in this one?” It wasn’t the first time he’d asked, but it was the first time he got a straight answer.

“A code that’ll tell my company that I’m sitting on a genetic gold mine. If they can only get here first and dig me out, we’ll all be rich-Earth’s luren as well as the humans. I told them to file a claim that will protect your legal rights, and to make all the appropriate appeals to create a special category for you. We’re one of the few firms in all the galaxy, Teleod and Metaji combined, who can do this for Earth. Trust me, Titus. I wouldn’t do anything to harm a parent of mine!”

Abbot came to take over escort duty, and Titus watched the two walk away. Maybe not to harm, but to risk, yes. Then he wondered where the thought had come from. H’lim had sounded so sure. But on the other hand, under Mirelle H’lim had mastered the body language and kinesics of the Near East, China, and Australia as well as North America. It had made him so effective in his dealings with the committees studying him, even the ones who understood the power of the unverbalized languages, that he didn’t need Influence.

Throughout this period, Inea and Titus still watched Abbot’s movements closely. One evening, about two weeks prior to the scheduled launch of the probe, Inea was at Titus’s vidcom screen drinking coffee and sifting the newest data on Abbot. Titus was sprawled on the bed doodling equations on a pad, his old mathematical proof that Influence, and so H’lim’s ability to grab language right out of Titus’s skull, couldn’t exist. Meanwhile, most of his mind was inventing methods of prying truth out of H’lim. Inea’s voice penetrated his reverie. “Either he’s installed his transmitter in the probe or he’s not going to at all.”

“What? Who?” Titus sat up. “Abbot? He’s supposed to be with H’lim.”

“He is right now, but I mean all this last week.”

He went to look over her shoulder at the graphs she’d made. “You’re right. He hasn’t been out to the probe hangar in days.” Heading for the door, he shrugged into his jacket.

“Where are you going?” She followed him.

“I’ll be right back.”

She slipped out the door behind him. “Titus!”

He put his hands on her shoulders. “I know Colby ordered me not to go out there. I’ll just check out what Abbot’s done, and be right back. Don’t worry, it’s night outside. I’ll be fine.”

“Titus, what will he do to you if he catches you destroying his work? You can’t just go rushing-”

He kissed her. “You’re supposed to relieve him in half an hour. Go early, see if you can keep them both occupied. I’ll come to the lab when I’m done.” He turned and strode away before she could object again.

Suited up, he rode with a shift change out to the probe. Colby had not lifted his clearance, so he was quite open about his presence. His mind, however, was on how he could possibly identify Abbot’s transmitter and what he’d do if he found it. From studying the plans of the hastily redesigned probe, he had a fair notion of where it must be. He had entertained ideas of editing Abbot’s message, or substituting one of his own, but had been unable to break into Abbot’s codes to steal either his message or the program that cast it into galactic communications protocols, which Abbot had no doubt lifted from Kylyd, and not shared with the humans. Titus hadn’t spent enough time on the luren language to draft his own message. Besides, what could, or should, a Resident say?

I have to remove the transmitter. I can put it back again before launch if it seems H’lim’s honest. How he’d explain such an act to Residents who had sacrificed to put him here, he didn’t know.