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and Alyn exchanged glances. Alyn gave a barely perceptible nod. Zed placed both hands, palms down, upon the table and stared at them for a moment before commencing.
    “Our home planet is located in what you call the Alpha Cygni system—nearly two thousand light years from your planet.” He looked up when Christine gasped.
    “That far! So you must…you must have trans-lightspeed travel!”
    Zed nodded. “Our race has known how to bend space time for centuries.”
    Christine sprang from her chair, reached across the table and seized his wrists. “Oh, Zed! Please, you’ve got to explain it to me!” The brawny alien turned to his companion with a vaguely desperate expression on his handsome features.
    “We are not physicists, Christine,” said Alyn. “But we will share what we can. Please allow us to tell our story in our own way, however.”
    “I’m sorry.” She settled back into her seat. “It’s just that…never mind. Please, continue. So you came here from Alpha Cygni. What happened to your ship?”
    “It, um, it was destroyed in a collision, as it emerged from hyperspace. Vaporised in an instant.”
    “A collision?” Christine spoke slowly, already guessing what was to come.
    “The probability of some other matter occupying the warp exit point is infinitesimal—but non-zero,” Alyn added. “We were extremely unlucky.”
    “The breach. It was you. Your ship…”
    “Yes,” whispered Zed. Once again he could not meet her eyes.
    “You’re responsible…” Christine thought of the nineteen bodies entombed in the non-functional suspension capsules. She tried to summon her anger, but could muster only a deep sorrow. “The crew…”
    “We are truly sorry, Christine.” Alyn’s face was grave. “It was, of course, an accident, but, yes, we are to blame for the deaths of your fellow travellers. Also for the fact that your ship is so far from its intended destination. The cataclysm ripped a hole in the space-time continuum and pushed you—all of us—through.”
    “Oh, God!” Christine buried her face in her hands. How bitterly ironic—the crew of the poor, sub-light Archimedes wiped out by a warp ship!
    A gentle hand stroked her tangled hair. “You understand now, why we are here? Why we must take care of you? Rescue you? Love you?” The pain was obvious in Zed’s voice.
    “We will bear the burden of this tragedy forever, Christine.” Alyn’s wiry arm encircled her shoulders. He pressed his warm body against hers and she half-expected some sexual overture, but he just held her tight while sobs racked her chest and tears trickled down her cheeks. “We will all bear it together.”
    For the first time since her awakening from suspension, Christine wept. She wept for Ravin and Amber and the rest of the brave souls who had sacrificed their lives for the sake of humanity. She wept for herself, lost, alone, a bitter failure, her last chance to redeem herself shattered by the blind randomness of the universe. She even wept for Alyn and Zed, sensing how terrible it must be to carry the weight of such guilt.
    Christine cried until there were no more tears—until her eyes were on fire and her throat was like sandpaper. All the while, the two alien men cradled her in their arms, supporting her, soothing her without words.
    Finally, she raised her head and pinned them with her red-rimmed eyes. “We’ve got to bury them.”
    “Yes, you’re right,” Zed agreed.
    “Come on.” She headed for the suspension bay, not waiting to see if they’d follow.
    It was difficult work, wrestling the inert bodies of the crew out of the pods and into pressure suits—difficult both physically and emotionally. The three of them tackled the grim task as a silent, well-coordinated team. No words seemed to be required. Nineteen times they hoisted an unwieldy corpse and carried it through the corridors to the airlock. Nineteen times they watched as a suited figure was ejected from the Archimedes to spin helplessly