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human space, on the verge of their own FTL flight, and so humans had hurried them on a little, needing all the friends they could get. Certainly the kuhsi had been pleased to be ‘discovered’ by humans and not krim, and humans had been good with them — letting them have their space, not interfering with local politics, giving them useful tech without asking anything but friendship in return. And kuhsi had reciprocated, not so much as to participate in humanity’s latest war, but to offer moral and trading support, and even a few irregular volunteers.
    “Friends,” said Erik’s mother above the crowd. She wore a red gown, her hair pulled back to a tasteful braid. One hundred and two years old, middle aged by the current human standard, though she barely looked it. Only a few crinkles about the eyes, which she could have vanished with treatments, yet kept for ‘character purposes’. When you were one of the regularly voted ‘ten most powerful’ people alive, she’d told him once, you had to have a few wrinkles or they wouldn’t take you seriously.
    Now she smiled at them all. In all honesty, Erik didn’t think she was a particularly great smiler. He’d seen her real smiles, and they were small, honest, private affairs. A careful amusement, well guarded and never abused. This was a big, ‘I love you all so much’ smile… and sometimes, when you knew someone this well, you just couldn’t buy it, because you knew it was false. He didn’t doubt that a lot of the others present also knew. The difference was that they didn’t care.
    “This truly is a fortuitous day,” she said through that big smile. “It has brought my beloved son Erik back to me.” Now the smile turned to him. Erik forced one of his own, all eyes temporarily upon him. “And it has brought a celebration of victory. A final victory, we hope, for all humankind, and for our valued allies.”
    She raised a glass at the chah'nas, who raised one back. Then at the kuhsi… Erik guessed he must be an ambassador of some sort also. A glass raised back. Hopefully the big-eared ambassador wouldn’t drink too much — unlike chah'nas, kuhsi did get drunk, often alarmingly so.
    “I’m sure our non-human guests are aware that it is customary on such grand occasions for the head of a family, or an institution, to recall the Great Journey. As I am both head of institution and of family — sorry darling,” with a glance at her husband by Erik’s side.
    “No she’s right,” Walker conceded to the room, who laughed obligingly.
    “Then this solemn retelling shall fall to me,” Alice continued. “In the name of all that has been so that all may yet come, as we build the glorious future, amen.”“Amen,” echoed the crowd. There was no shortage of Destinos symbols among those gathered, the circle-and-crescent in earrings, pendants or on ties, the crescent rising behind the circle like a sunrise upon a planetary horizon, and pierced by a single line rising up to infinity. Many of the Debogande family’s charities were Destinos charities. More a Spacer religion than a Worlder one, it was a statement of identity through faith for many Spacers, not to mention a networking opportunity through such institutions.
    “Once upon a time,” Alice began, “there was a race of people called humans. We lived upon a beautiful planet called Earth, and it had supported us as a species for more than three million years. Eventually we evolved to venture from our homeworld, but no sooner had we learned how to do so than our efforts were noticed, because faster-than-light travel is detectable far and wide. Humans learned that we were directly alongside the territory of a powerful race called the krim.
    “We hoped that the krim could be our friends, but the krim were an evil and brutal race, who lived only to inflict pain on others. Krim invaded our beautiful world, and ravaged the resources of our solar system. In desperation the humans called out to the other