Two weeks into their tenure on his world and Aleksandr hadn't received many more invitations. Only two, to be precise. One per week, as though they didn't want him to think they had forgotten about him but weren't prepared to have him at their gatherings just yet. It wasn't hard to guess why.

"In retrospect this may not have been the wisest plan," Andreas murmured, then didn't elaborate on why. Beata and Aleksandr looked at him for a moment while they waited for him to explain, looked at each other, and shook their heads. "Are we ready?"

They were presenting their findings to the Foreign Affairs Bureau. Aleksandr wasn't as nervous about it as he thought he maybe should have been, but this was also familiar territory, familiar actions. And he knew the other two were competent enough at similar debriefings to pull themselves off well. Beata had her princess face on, her dress smooth and neat as any corporate head he had ever seen and her manners impeccable. Andreas, for a degree of contrast, was monosyllabic and very, very military, but also radiating an aura of experience and authority that very few people could contradict without lying through their teeth.

"I suppose we are."

Beata smoothed down her skirt over her thighs, which led him to rest a hand between her shoulders as they walked in. They sat in three chairs behind a table, facing a row of other chairs and the officious looking people in them. Aleksandr even knew most of them, though they hadn't been in those positions when he'd last seen them. There had been a political shakeup at least at Foreign Affairs.

"What can you tell us about the operations of your government, how they might react to our current political situation?"

That was directed at Beata, at least at first. She narrowed her eyes and seemed about to deliver a blistering rebuke when she picked up the small qualifying word that Aleksandr had a moment ago. What she could tell them might be somewhat different from all that she knew.

She outlined the hierarchy of the ruling family, their inclinations and how much power they had. "My mother may be your best ally, but she might also be your worst enemy. She likes change in the nation, but she likes it at her own pace. I haven't seen anything yet to indicate that she objects to the pace at which things are going, but if she decides she doesn't want to do something she will dig in her heels, fortify her position, and she might do it at the expense of trade or humanitarian aid on all our border worlds."

That raised a few pairs of eyebrows. "She would be ruthless enough to sacrifice her own people?"

"In her mind it would be pragmatism, but yes. She still sees..." Under the table her foot reached over and curled around Aleksandr's ankle, and as she spoke he realized what it was in aid of. "... this planet as a superstitious backwater at worst. The superstitious part, for certain."

It did make Aleksandr feel somewhat better that she had anticipated the clench in his stomach, and was keeping contact to alleviate it as best she could. The 'superstitious backwater' comment didn't go over well with the Foreign Affairs Bureau members, either. There was some disapproving looks, some sounds, there might have been murmurs if they were less respected enough that they would have been talked in front of.

Beata waited for the uncomfortableness to die down and spread her hands, apologetic. Far more, Aleksandr thought, than she would have been not so long ago. "My mother doesn't allow as anyone else knows more or better than she does. She's always been that way; it's been a point of contention between her and the King. She'll allow that there are facts she might not have, especially in a situation where that's been made apparent to her, but then she'll only try to get as many of the facts as she believes exist, and everything else she rules out as spin or ..." Doctrine. Something else.

Small, slow nods. More questions, rapid fire, most of them aimed at Beata, some of them aimed at all three of them. All of them centered around her nation. Andreas took his turn next, speaking in crisp, clear syllables, efficient language, like a military briefing.

"Our resources stretch from..."

"... reconstruction at Nijinski Station..."

Endless questions. Answers that were, essentially, the same thing with different names plugged in. Facts they took for granted and hadn't had to explain before repeated until they made no sense. By the time it was over the night had well begun, and none of them wanted to do more than go home, shower, and fall into bed.

Out of all the news channels, Andreas found it disconcerting that only two were devoted with any amount of seriousness to news coming out of the other nations. Several others purported to be news channels, but one of them consisted entirely of sports and the other two, while in his native language, contained mostly entertainment gossip and rumors of who was bedding who and who had betrayed whom in marriage and so on.

It wasn't that he missed having access to the news, because he still had the text on his device that brought him any newsfeed he might wish, within reason. But there was something he was missing, the look of the announcer as they read the news, maybe. The body language information, the tone of his or her voice, something. He was used to sitting down at the end of the day and watching a few programs, dammit. Most of them boring and informative, but he was used to it.

A few days into this disgruntlement he might be willing to admit that it was less the lack of news and more the lack of hearing his native language that bothered him. And still, rather than confess that weakness to either of his spouses he said he was going to run an errand and slipped out of the house one afternoon when Aleksandr was away at a meeting.

There were small enclaves of ex-patriots, refugees from the fighting, in the slums of the city. Or what was called the slums. Poorer than everyone else, they nonetheless maintained the discipline of his homeworld, and he was glad to see that at least it was a safe place to walk. Children playing in the streets, parents sitting in front of quick-build apartments keeping an eye on them, everyone taking care of each other. And all around him, the torrent of voices. Understanding flowing freely from their lips to his ears without the second or two's worth of delay as he translated it into a form he understood. He sat down under a tree and closed his eyes and just listened for a little while.

Andreas opened his eyes again when he realized he was being watched. "Hello, little one." A small girl, eight years old maybe, stood in front of his feet watching him. With wide eyes. "Are you lost?"

"You're him, aren't you," she said, two fingers creeping into her mouth before she realized that grown-ups didn't suck on their fingers and took them down again. "You're the General who made the beace treaty."

"Peace treaty," he smiled. "And I'm not a general, I'm a Commander. And yes, I am."

Her next question took him even more by surprise. "Are you here to take over the world?"

For the first second or two he didn't know what to say. And then he didn't know how to explain what was happening to her without challenging her ideas of how the world worked, ideas that her parents had no doubt taught her and that he didn't want to overturn.

"No," he temporized, taking a little longer to say that single syllable than he would have. "No, I'm here to make sure we can all understand each other, so that there will be no more wars."

That wasn't an adequate explanation, he could see it by her eyes. "How are you going to do that?"

Good question. "Well," he pulled himself up into a crouch, a little more on her level and a little more engaging as he kept her gaze on his face. "Me, and Princess Beata, and Lord Aleksandr..." Which wasn't really his title but it sounded better. "We all made a promise to each other, and to our worlds. That we would figure out problems before they became wars, and that we would teach each other about our worlds so that we would better understand each other. Because when there are misunderstandings, that opens the way to conflict. Fighting, and then war..." And so on and so forth, no need to scare the poor child.

She frowned a little more, two fingers coming up to her mouth again, and this time she did suck on them. Belligerently, as her mother came up behind her. "Allie, don't bother the... nice gentleman," she trailed off, eyes widening.

"Ma'am," he stood, extending a hand to shake. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb anyone, I was just feeling a little..."

"Homesick?" the woman managed a smile as she shook his hand, still clearly unprepared for his visit. "Yes, of course, why wouldn't you be. I'm Marina."

"Andreas Zakarios, Commander," he nodded, then made a more formal, military bow. "I was just explaining to your daughter how the peace treaty is working."

Her smile faded almost instantly. "Poorly, I heard. There's no de-mobilization of troops..."

He'd heard about that too; one of the conversations he and the other two had been in on was a discussion of how best to accomplish that. "De-mobilization is being negotiated even as we speak, I promise. With the shipping routes between worlds still undetermined formally, the logistics are harder to manage, and there's the prisoner exchange..."

Of which there was supposed to be one between his people and Aleksandr's shortly. He wondered if he had missed it, or if everyone had simply kept it so low-profile that it hadn't made the news yet. Or if these small international enclaves didn't get so much current news. Or if there was some other explanation; the way she talked she didn't seem to be under the impression that the war was over.

"Of course..." Marina nodded, her face clearing a little. "I'm sorry, you must know all about these things and I must seem very simple to you..." Her daughter, sensing her mother's unease, stepped and hid behind her legs.

"No, not at all. These are... confusing times. For all of us. And I'm afraid information hasn't been flowing as freely as might be reassuring, but not everyone wants to see the peace continue, so we have to be careful."

Not what a woman raising a child alone wanted to hear, or at least, that's what he guessed she was. But it was the truth, and coming from a public figure as high in the news as he had been lately, that was something, wasn't it? He hoped it was, at least.

Andreas spent several more hours in the district, with the families, but nothing he heard made him feel any better. At least, not as much as he would have wished.

They were still awake when he returned, after dinner and far later than he meant to. Apologies were on his lips when he realized they hadn't paid any attention to the door, hadn't even been looking his way.

"What's going on?" he asked, not quite asking. Something was going on, something bad. They were curled up together on the couch and watching the news.

Andreas came and sat down on the other side of Beata when they didn't answer, waiting for the broadcast to start from the beginning again. It didn't take more than a moment or two for the gist of it to hit him; there were buildings on fire, and when the camera pulled back he could see an entire wing of a space station was on fire.That strange, liquid zero-gravity fire coiled itself around some areas. They would have trouble keeping all the environmentals online.

"When did this happen?" he asked, his own voice strained in his ears.

"Sound off," Aleksandr muttered, and the news program went silent. "Two hours ago, at a guess. The news hit two hours ago and it was almost immediate, so it must have been between two and three hours ago."

It was one of Beata's stations, he realized. By the insignia. Which explained why she was now curled against Aleksandr with her head buried in his chest. He reached out and touched her back, fingertips light down the arch of her spine, feeling the bone press gently against flesh and fabric. There wasn't anything he could say to make it better, was there. The screen read out a death toll, but it would be hard to determine whether or not that was an accurate count just yet.

"Do they a... Have any suspects been named? Has anyone claimed responsibility?"

"Not that we've been able to tell..." Beata sniffed, and her voice was muffled against Aleksandr's chest but still clear, as clear as it could be. "There's no telling anything right now, the fire's still too hot for even investigative robots to go in."

Ship fuel. Ship fuel burned hotter than almost anything human-made, it would make things difficult to get into. The light touch turned into an open palm, rubbing between her shoulders, and she straightened a little, wiping the back of her hand over her eyes. "Where were you?"

Now he felt a little guilty for being away at such a time, not that he could have known. "I went to the Little Tiberium District."

Beata frowned; Aleksandr understood, if not immediately then as soon as he realized what population lived there. He just nodded. "Homesick?"

"A little bit. This is ..." He shook his head. "This is an act of terrorism. More importantly, it is a threatening act against the peace treaty. We should... we should all have investigative teams in on this."

His little wife's lips thinned, disapproving. "Mother's already spoken, and in this case I think the King agrees. She's said that no outside force or personnel is to interfere in the investigation. That this is an internal matter and will be dealt with as such, dissidents, or something."

Andreas exchanged a look with his husband over her head. It was in his mind that there wasn't any reason for her to be so insular with her people and their safety, unless there was something to hide. Which could have been paranoia talking, except that he had heard discussions of many false flag operations to keep the war going, to keep the war in favor with the population. It was always ruled out, at least in the discussions he had been a part of, because they were awkward to handle and never went well when they were discovered.

"She can't argue if we send our own people, our people, to make inquiries, can she?" Aleksandr asked, murmuring against her forehead but looking at the older man. "If we send them as a personal favor to Beata, it would make it very hard for her to refuse, especially if we do so..."

"Publicly," Beata offered. "It'd make her much less inclined to lose face by turning it down. That could work."

"We'll put that together in the morning, then." Andreas nodded, reaching to turn off the newsfeed. "Until then there's nothing we can do except to get some sleep so that our minds are clearer and thinking better tomorrow."

Beata protested, as he expected she might, but they were weak and tired protests. Aleksandr scooped her up into his arms anyway, and together the three of them trudged up to bed. It might be a long time before they got to sleep but they could at least make the effort.

They made the announcement in the morning.

The three of them stood at the podium, Beata tiny at the center with her two men on either side of her, like bodyguards. Their actual bodyguards stood some distance off, if close enough to be picked up by the cameras. It had been her idea, even, to have her standing at the podium with one hand on either side gripping it as though she needed it to help keep her upright. She didn't have to enhance her makeup to make her look tired and haggard, either. They had cancelled all appointments for that day and the next, and in deference to the catastrophe happening in her world everyone had agreed without comment.

"We accepted this gesture of peace and friendship on behalf..." The words were chosen carefully, not to usurp her mother's authority but to admit the help for her own peace of mind, slipping in a reference here and there to being on a strange world for the rest of the year yet, and a need for peace of mind.

There were a few dirty looks. She hadn't counted on it upsetting certain others' peace of mind to have foreign investigators in on it.

"As a joint operation, not only will this be symbolic of the peace we are building, but it will be a practical occasion to test the boundaries of our friendship. That both nations have offered help so quickly speaks well of the potential of this peace to last, no matter what terroristic groups may try to achieve. We are grateful for the assistance." And humanitarian aid, relief ships obeying the covenant of the spacefarer and picking up all the distress calls in their vicinity, etcetera.

The speech lasted only twenty minutes. They didn't have time to come up with more and she was fairly sure neither of the men was certain she could hold up even that long. And while in the morning she had assured them that she could, now that she was faced with a wall of glowing headsets and intruding reporters she wasn't sure that was such a good idea. Aleskandr, ever the diplomat, stepped forward with his grave and impassive face on to answer questions. Yes, they had arrived at this together, working late into the night to arrange it. Yes, they had all seen the news, and the Queen's decree. Yes, they had discussed it with her, which was a slight lie. Beata had called her mother that morning and asked if there was anything she could do to help, but hadn't really received an answer and had been evasive as to what she was offering.

Her mother had been evasive right back at her, which she took as a sign that things were happening at home that worried the older woman. Further trouble. Beata didn't like the sound of that, and thinking back on it made her grip the podium to stand for real this time, but if anyone noticed they seemed to take it in the same stride as they'd taken her show earlier.

"How much more can you withstand?" Andreas murmured, lips barely moving, keeping himself back and away from the pickup range of the mics.

She reached to hold his hand, squeezing, trying to think how much longer she really could take this. Not much. Not and still be a political figure, a princess, it was all blurring together. She was trying to figure out how to convey something along the lines of five minutes more when Andreas looked over, cleared his throat, caught Aleksandr's attention. He looked back at them for a moment and that was when the reporter struck.

"Princess Beata, what do your investigators say to the rumors that this was a false flag operation, perpetrated by members within your own government in order to resurrect the war and claim responsibility by foreign terrorists?"

The world spun around her. She knew they had to be thinking about the possibility by the way neither of the men reacted, but for an instant the words didn't make sense. She stared, trying to muster up the words.

"We have heard no credible evidence to that effect," Aleksandr replied for her. "But we will follow the investigation wherever it leads. This peace will be a joint effort between all three parties as representatives of our nations, and to that effect we will investigate and pursue the actual culprits of this despicable act of terrorism, whatever the motivation or the originating organization."

"So, you would say that you are waging your own war on ..."

It was a muckraker, Beata told herself. That was all, just some muckraking reporter looking for the most dramatic story possible, there was no truth to the rumors. Just one of those nasty things that came up, fueled by conspiracy theorists and cheered on by people who wanted nothing more than to see public figures humiliated and embarrassed. She knew such people existed. She'd dealt with them all her life.

"I would say," Aleksandr kept his calm better than she would have, his face an impassive mask even if she could read the tension in his back and shoulders. "I would say that this is a heinous act perpetrated by wicked folk, and that we will find them and bring them to justice." Nothing political, nothing about who they might suspect, nothing that the reporters could take and use unless they involved illegal editing software.

He was familiar with this gauntlet. And protective. A slight gesture with two fingers at their press secretary indicated that person was to be ignored for the future, and thankfully the rest of the questions were more reasonable. Did they have any leads, what was being done for the survivors, how many had survived, would the victim list be released any time soon.

She stepped up at that point. There was no honor or comfort for her people who were exiled from their home in her hiding behind Aleksandr all the time. "We will release the victim list as soon as we have reasonable confirmation of the survivors," she told them. "It shouldn't be more than another twenty six standard hours. If you have a name in particular, there is a line set up where you can call to see if that person or persons' status has been confirmed." Not alive or dead, but status confirmed. Giving them hope without giving them false hope. The line in question played over the podium and she knew it was playing over the newsfeeds picking up the broadcast as she spoke.

It nagged at her that that line hadn't been given out before, from the official broadcast. Maybe no one who had been selected to ask the questions had seen that particular feed. But it should have been all over the place, that was one of the first things that went out, the hotline to call and asked after loved ones who might have been in the blast.

The rest of the press conference went by in a blur, and she barely remembered staggering out to the vehicle, supported by a strong arm on either side.

After the press conference they had a few hours to themselves. Beata went straight up to their bed, to try and sleep it off, but the nervousness and the upset kept her awake and staring at the ceiling. Unlike last time, they sat with her. Or tried to, since Aleksandr did a bit of pacing around the house, but Andreas sat with her on the bed, legs stretched out and reading an old book. With actual paper; she had no idea where he'd found that.

"Do you..." she started, then discarded the question as silly and shook her head.

He looked at her regardless. "Do I what?"

She scrubbed the heel of one hand up and down over her face. "Do you think the, um. The person who asked that, the reporter. Do you think they could be right? That it could be a false flag job?"

He put the book aside and tugged her in against him, one lean and solid arm around her shoulders. She snuggled into him, burying her face in the warmth of his shirt and his body, hiding in the scent of him and the now-familiar presence of her husband. When exactly he had become more comforting than awkward and strange, she didn't know, but she was glad of it now.

"I think that there is too little data to be certain what happened, right now," he temporized, both of them knowing it was an excuse. A rationalization, something to point out before they got into the meat of the discussion. "I honestly don't know what to think, love. All we know at the moment was that it was an explosion triggered by a bomber or group of bombers who likely perished along with everyone else in the vicinity. Whether they intended to martyr themselves or were betrayed by their employer, it's hard to say. And once we figure that part out, we might be a little closer to finding out who directed them. Unless someone claims responsibility, of course."

She blinked, fingers curling tighter around his arm. That was the first time he'd called her that. The rest of the words skipped off the surface of her thoughts for a minute or two, all of it too heavy to process at once. They didn't know enough, that was the first thing. The second thing was that it was deliberate, a group of bombers, and many had died. All facts that she knew, that were undisputed and in evidence.

"I don't know that anyone would claim responsibility even if they originally intended to," Aleksandr pointed out, coming back into the room. "I've been keeping an eye on the newsfeeds, at the moment the mood is decidedly against whoever did this. There won't be much sympathy, and there's a great deal of public outcry for a general manhunt."

Andreas frowned above her head; she could hear it in his voice. "That's a change from last night."

Her younger husband's voice was grim, and thick with satisfaction. "There might have been more publication of photos of the victims and the survivors, and their loved ones, since then. It's hard to do anything but condemn the atrocity when you're faced with such nakedly pitiable footage."

"Sneaky," Andreas commented dryly, shifting to accommodate Beata's struggling to sit up. "You?"

"Actually, no. But I know who did it, it's right in line with her thinking. She's an altruist at the core, but around that core of good feeling and compassion is a whole mess of manipulation skills and cynicism."

"You've just described most of the decent people in politics," Beata muttered. "All right, do we at least have a list of all the known organizations with extremist views? Politically extremist views, not..." She didn't know enough about what other controversies might be brewing in Andreas' nation, and she was still too scattered to think what might warrant blowing something up according to terrorists here where they were now. Economic factors, she thought. Not strongly enough to say anything, though.

"I requested the list, it should be in everyone's inboxes." Aleksandr came and sat down on the edge of the bed, one leg tucked in close and providing an ankle for his hands to grip.

Andreas nodded. "I'll request one from my friends in counter-intelligence. Beata..."

She didn't know where she could get a list that her mother wouldn't find out about it. Then again, after this press conference, her mother would know anyway. That had been the whole point. "I'll see what I can do."

One of Aleksandr's hands unclenched from his ankle, reaching out to stroke her calf. "You don't have to do this today, you know," he told her, his mask of diplomacy and solemnity cracking for the first time in the last several hours. "You can rest, we can manage without you."

"No you can't," she smiled, though. The effort was deeply appreciated, and lovely. "People would wonder where I was, if you were overbearing or somehow contravening my decisions. If I wasn't just the mouthpiece for you, put out there for show so people from my world wouldn't suspect. And at least if I go out there and speak for my people I'll be doing something. It's better than sitting here resting all day."

She suspected Andreas of making some kind of expression over her head that was supposed to mean something. Aleksandr's eyes flickered upwards to where his face would be, then back to her again, but he only nodded. They didn't have to rush out, at least. They had another couple of standard hours to sit and recover, and reach a point where they could think clearly about what was going on. Her more than them. Which might be uncharitable, she realized a moment later. They would be just as distressed about her distress, and the loss of life, as she was.

Beata sighed, burrowing back into Andreas again, not to turn away from her other husband but to hide her face and pretend the outside world didn't exist for a little while. Behind her, she felt Aleksandr come up on her other side, felt his strong, slender hand over her back and heard his voice in a hoarse, lightly accented lullaby from home. Not one that her mother had sung to her, but she'd heard it before, she knew the intention. And she was grateful, anyway.

They met downstairs after Beata had fallen asleep again, this time unintentionally. Andreas had stayed up with his book, reading, and Aleksandr just hadn't been able to sleep but had expected that the other man would eventually settle down upstairs. Which didn't happen. Eventually Andreas appeared in the archway at the bottom of the stairs and the younger man looked up to see him gravely staring, arms folded and reading tablet tucked under the crook of one elbow.

He didn't say anything. He didn't suppose either of them really needed to. Andreas followed him into the kitchen, where he made some tea and perched on a stool as still as he could, which wasn't very.

"What do you think is going on?" he asked finally, unsure of the answer.

Andreas frowned, took a sip of tea and held the cup cradled in his palms, breathing in the steam and scent while he thought. "I think something is going on underneath the surface. What, and to what end, and at whose direction I don't yet know."

"But..." There was a but there, Aleksandr could hear it.

"But I do think, as I suspect you do, that Beata's mother is behind it."

And there it was. Though Aleksandr hadn't dared mention it out loud and neither of them evidently felt it was worth even suggesting to Beata, even in some back-handed obscure fashion, he had thought something similar ever since seeing the older woman's press releases. Refusing all assistance from outside parties, insisting on vengeance more often than on justice, the careful focus on the atrocity and the horror without enabling anyone to do anything about the survivors or the repair, at least until forced to it. Those were not the actions of someone who genuinely wanted to help. Those were the actions of a rabble-rouser who wanted a war.

And they had just concluded one. "How much evidence do you think she can manufacture?" And then, while Andreas thought that over. "You know she'll most likely pin it on your people or mine."

"If she thinks she can get away with it, most definitely." He shook his head, took a long drink of his tea and hissed as it burned its way down. "I would say my people more than yours, but it's always possible they will portray yours as rigid-minded bigots bent on destroying them for their decadent ways."

Aleksandr winced, but he couldn't deny that there was at least a little grain of truth in that. There were conservative elements on this very planet, let alone on some of the other holdings, who made murmurs about the ornate architecture and the strange sexual practices of Beata's people. Decadent ways might be overstating it, at least in public, but that didn't matter, did it?

"And then she'll have all the excuse she needs to declare this treaty null and void." He frowned. "What I don't understand is, why. Her people were... she was the one who pushed for this solution. Or so I was given to believe."

"She might have pushed for this solution to buy her time to accomplish something else. It might not be playing out as she expected. She might..." Andreas smiled, but it was a cold and aggressive expression. "She might even have expected that Beata would be able to control us in some way, and ..."

His face smoothed out, his eyes went distant. Aleksandr gave it another minute or two before he nudged. "And...?"

"She didn't keep in touch with us while we were at Beata's estate, not very often at least. Undoubtedly she would be getting reports from both Beata and other ... other representatives, but we knew about those. Was there something in those reports or did she have other spies in our household, and does she still have those spies..."

"Assuming that something between the three of us is her reason for trying to undermine the treaty, some balance of power she doesn't like." Aleksandr shook his head. "We need to gather our own information before we can make any decisions, any plans."

Andreas flicked his gaze up to the bedroom. "At least as far as dealing with her. What do you want to do about Beata?"

He didn't want to think about that, was what he wanted to do. He didn't want to think about telling his wife that her mother was trying to tear them and their nations apart. He was starting to feel like a husband, like a person who had a wife, who cared for her and cherished her and took care of her. Which didn't mean he knew what to do. And he didn't want to see her hurt.

"I don't know. Tonight, obviously, we should let her sleep..." and implied in there was that he would be staying downstairs if he couldn't sleep. "But tomorrow... I would say that we don't tell her about our suspicions."

"Until we have proof? And then ..." Andreas visibly played the scenario out in his head, eyes flicking back and forth, face creasing as he didn't like whatever it was he imagined. "Give it a day or so, and then tell her our suspicions, I think. If we approach it as one of many possible angles, possible circumstances, she may take it less personally."

"Personally..." The younger man shook his head. Personally was such a calm word for it. If he was told that his father or mother tried to destroy what he had chosen to build with his life, he would be deeply upset. And Beata, of the three of them, had been the most aware of what she was getting into. And the most emotionally invested in its success. She believed in what they were doing, and on the strength of that belief they had come around as well.

Aleksandr sighed. Andreas's hand landed on his shoulder. "There's nothing we can do tonight," he repeated, the way they had been repeating all night. "I'm going to go up and join her, don't be too long?"

The rest of their time there seemed to pass by much more quickly. So much of it was spent on that one thing, threading through the mess that the terrorist attack left that there wasn't as much time for cultural exchange as had originally been intended. By the time they started packing up again to travel, Andreas wondered how it had only been a few months since they'd landed.

To be sure, different worlds had different lengths of time, depending on the distance and the spin. But there were some things that were standardized: hours, months were aligned as best they could be. Weeks. It still took a feat of mathematics to calculate an appropriate and equal amount of time between all three nations, but it was only months in each one, and those months had gone by, it felt like, in the time it took to blink and turn around.

"It's a shirt," Aleksandr's voice came from over his shoulder. "I believe it goes in your personal luggage."

He heard the smile before he turned, pulling a face at him and folding the garment with precise and habitual gestures. "I was thinking." As though he needed to justify why he had been standing there staring at nothing, or maybe it was to reassure the other man.

"About what?" Aleksandr, who had already packed his share of the bedroom and was now going over it to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything, seemed the most eager of the three of them to leave. It puzzled Beata; it had puzzled Andreas until he realized that maybe Aleksandr would prefer to be in a world that didn't seem so familiar and yet so strange and hostile at the same time.

"About... how quickly time has passed. Since we moved into the, the Winter Palace? To Beata's estate." It had been winter on his world, he used the familiar term, then switched over again. It hadn't been winter where they were. Strange. Time kept slipping by and around him without his noticing.

Small shake of the dark, well-groomed head, as Aleksandr began pulling open drawers and checking them for anything more than dust. "We've had a lot to do. Keeping busy always makes the time seem to pass faster."

"Mm, perhaps." He started in on the next stack of clothes. "We've also had a lot of changes to become accustomed to, all of us. Big and small changes, it adds up." Being persona non grata in the social circles even if all the politicians and diplomats and advisers and anyone with half a brain treated him politely, that was new. At least, for the reasons he was treated so coldly.

Aleksandr's hand stilled on the second to last drawer, then resumed sweeping. "It'll settle down in a year or two."

Now he stopped again and turned to look at the younger man, folded shirt by his side. "You know, I think that's the first time I've ever heard you refer to us in the long term," he said out loud, after giving a moment's consideration to what it might mean or how it might make the other man feel to have it noted aloud.

"Is it?" he swept a hand through the bottom drawer and then went over to the closet, but Andreas caught the tiny smile before he turned completely away. And his tone wasn't as nonchalant as maybe his husband would like to believe, although Andreas liked to think they were all aware of how much better they knew each other by now.

After waiting for any more response Andreas shook his head, chuckling, went back to folding. Easier in his mind, a little, or more settled or some similar thing. A little lighter for knowing that they all were making a solid go of this; out of all of them Aleksandr had been the uncertain one, who kept to himself and didn't share his dreams of the future. Beata, the most obvious, had always spoken of how they could build a lasting peace and a new beginning for free travel between their nations, a world of accord and trade and exchange. Andreas had tacitly supported her and not so tacitly, with a few comments, but Aleksandr hadn't said anything.

Until now, at least. It was good to have it out in the open.

Beata trudged upstairs and stretched out on the bed behind Andreas's garment case, eyes closed and burying her face in her pillow with a groan. The men exchanged a look.

"Problems?"

"I just sent our itinerary to my mother," she muttered, still hiding her face in the pillow. "I have no idea what'll happen now but it's sure not to be pleasant."

Aleksandr left off his study of the closet to come sit by her on the edge of the bed, rubbing between her shoulders. "She might surprise you," he offered, while Andreas ducked his head and attended to his folding lest he say something unfortunate. He was almost done, anyway.

"She'll probably surprise me, but not in a good way. At least the recovery initiative is going well."

The station, or former station, had been cleared of debris and bodies. Not everyone had been accounted for and it was looking increasingly likely that not everyone ever would, but most of the people had been found and identified, living or dead. All three nations had agreed to provide a communications bank of counselors for the survivors and the first responders for up to the longest solar year. And there were still discussions on whether or not to rebuild.

If there was any sort of foul play involved, it wasn't coming to light quickly. Which was both a good and a bad thing.

"At least there is that," Aleksandr agreed, and Andreas nodded, settling his clothes in the bag and latching it shut.

"It's more than we would have managed alone," he pointed out, moving the luggage to the floor and sitting next to her as Beata turned over so she could see her husbands. Her eyes were red-rimmed and half-focused for a moment, and both men frowned. "Are you sure you're all right?"

"I'll be all right," she murmured, staring ceilingward. And then, "Mother was there when I called."

"Ah." That was enough to put her in this state, yes. Andreas pulled her up against him, leaving Aleksandr to sit with her and hold her hand. They waited for a minute or two to see if she would say anything further, but she didn't. And if she didn't want to talk about it, by the look Aleksandr exchanged with him, they weren't going to make her.

Packing could wait another little while. They were ahead of schedule, at least in this, they could take a few minutes or even a few hours to sit in silence and take care of each other. They had had so little time for that lately.

None of them could agree on what they expected from their departure: a grand send-off or a quiet exit. By the time they reached the spaceport it seemed to be a little of both. There was the same honor guard that greeted them when they'd arrived, and a modest selection of news organizations represented by men and women with their recording rigs, but nothing much in the way of live crowds. Beata ascended to the ship first, saying good-bye to all the staffers with a hand-shake and a hug for those whom she'd grown closest to.

Andreas went next. And he shook hands with the Admiral representing the military branch, both of them in rigid posture and stern faces, two soldiers having met and discussed and come to agreement of some kind. Aleksandr wasn't sure what they'd talked about but there had been three or four meetings at the Flight Compound, most of which had left Andreas looking satisfied and relaxed.

"Sir." Andreas saluted in the manner of Aleksandr's people, while their own Admiral returned the opposite salute. It looked odd. And caused a number of murmurings from the press to one side, although no one seemed able to agree on what it meant.

Aleksandr thought, privately, that it only meant a mutual respect and satisfaction with whatever it was they'd learned about each other. But he could ask Andreas later, when they were aboard and taking advantage of the respite in travel.

And then it was his turn. The people who were here to bid him good-bye were some different from the ones he'd expected at the start of this trip.

Damiano wasn't there, to begin with. Relations between the two of them had chilled and he didn't know if they would ever be the same as they had been. More disturbing, when he thought about it, was that he didn't know if he wanted that any longer. Cera, however, was there, and for all her discomfort with Andreas's presence she did shake Aleksandr's hand and he knew her well-wishes to be genuine. A few others who he had coolly known before had warmed to him now. He wondered if that had something to do with his change in station, or more to do with his marital status.

The last one he was certain was Andreas's fault, and it was the most awkward. Tom stood a little distance away, as though unsure of his reception or maybe unsure what the cameras would make of their good-byes. Aleksandr felt his stomach churn a little. The cameras wouldn't pay attention to them. they were more concerned with the fact that Aleksandr had a husband, an aide wouldn't draw any attention. And yet to Tom it must seem as though everything that passed between them were obvious and freakish.

How long, Aleksandr still wondered, had this been going on? Long enough for Tom to barely react when Aleksandr introduced his husband as such.

"You could always come with us," he offered. It wasn't what he'd meant to say for a good-bye, but the other man wasn't smiling, wasn't relaxed. Tense and solemn eyed to the point of being sad.

He shook his head, anyway. "I still have work to finish here. You've managed to turn a lot of things upside-down in a few months," he added, with a twist of his mouth that mimicked but wasn't a smile.

Aleksandr was fluent in double-meanings. He knew what Tom had said under saying something else. "I didn't mean to cause quite that much of a stir," he replied, to both statements. "Things look different when you have an opportunity to go that far outside of what you know and then ... come back."

Not as much of an apology as Tom might deserve, but it would have to do. His shoulders relaxed. A little bit. "Not that much different. Some circumstances are still the same."

"But they never stay the same for long. Especially in this line of work," Aleksandr smiled a little. "Who knows where you'll be stationed next." Somewhere that permitted that kind of, erm. Interaction. Somewhere he might find someone more open to his point of view. "Don't lose hope."

"I'll try not to," he nodded, and then they hugged, a brief, backslapping thing so that no one could mistake them for having an affair. Or whatever might occur to their audience. "You take care of them. They're good people."

"I will," Aleksandr chuckled, finished his farewells and waved one last time before ascending the steps and disappearing into the bowels of the ship.

The first thing Beata noticed about Andreas' nation was that all the ships were smaller. Or at least, a number of them were. The carrier ships that met them at the station, the drop ship that took them down to the planet, they were noticeably smaller and more military in style. Utilitarian. Everything with its purpose, no ornamentation that did not also carry some function, either to direct a person or to alleviate a psychological pressure of time spent in space.

No, that was unfair. There was some ornamentation that, as far as she could tell, had nothing to do with function. But very little of it.

Even so, she felt crowded and uncomfortable. Everyone walked with a purpose, straight-backed and heels clacking on the deck. Courtesies were brisk and lacking even the false sincerity she was used to. Although she had to admit there seemed to be more genuine respect between persons giving those courtesies than most places she had been.

"Respect the uniform, even if you don't respect the man," Andreas commented, when she pointed that out. "When you've had that drummed into your head enough times, it guides your behavior. And the vast majority of men and women who wear the uniform have done something to earn at least that much respect, devoting themselves to a cause and an ideal greater than themselves."

Beata still found that strange, having been raised to the idea that she had a duty that went beyond personal preference simply as a matter of who she was. Aleksandr nodded slightly, understanding better, if still more cynical. "And if by their behavior they sacrifice that respect, well, they have no one to blame but themselves."

Andreas's smile was thin, tired. "True," he nodded. "There's always those few who don't feel the need to give out respect for respect..."

The discussion faded as the landing platform came into view, tiny in the distance but closing fast. This high up everything appeared to be a mass of varying shades of gray, separated as they came down by lines of darker gray to black where the roadways parted the buildings. A little closer and she saw spots of color with deep relief, shades of green and browns and blues, a little water, a little earth. One of the splotches of blue she was startled to see was a stand of trees that evidently processed chlorophyll in a different way than usual.

"It looks like it's raining," she murmured. Face, hands pressed to the window.

It took Andreas a moment or two to calculate up what season it would be here, then he nodded. "It's the rainy season. Everything will be waterlogged for days..."

Aleksandr and Beata exchanged a look, although by now she thought this should be familiar to both of them. The strange sensation of watching their partner looking down on his or her homeworld after so long away from it, wondering if they themselves looked that lost and distant when it was their turn. Yes, Beata thought, they probably had. It was a hard thing to leave your home, maybe harder still to come back to it after you had been through a period of learning to do new things and questioning the way you had done things before.

"How does that affect..." she started, then couldn't figure out how to say what she meant. Aleksandr picked it up, or at least, close enough.

"What kinds of activities are customary during the rainy season?" he asked, in his smooth and diplomatic voice but with a face creased in concern. Not that Andreas was looking at them, either of them, at the moment. "Are there... is there some sort of festival, or..."

It took him a moment, but he shook his head. "Everyone stays indoors, for the most part. There are councils and there are meetings and lobbyists try to bend politicians to whatever agenda they have at the time. Because travel is difficult, it's seen as a prime opportunity to catch the attention of a key lawmaker without interference. Other than that..." Now he lifted his head, some of the far-away look clearing. "And anyway, it's not the rainy season the whole planet over."

"Of course not," Beata smiled a little. But it was the rainy season in the capital, where he was from, and it looked as though it was the rainy season over a great deal of the continent. "How far does the storm spread?"

Another small headshake. "Not usually this far, it's bigger this year. And the storm systems usually stay for days."

And they were coming down in the middle of it. Beata's hands tightened on the rail beneath the window; as unlikely as it was, she still felt as though the ship rocked with the weather. They dropped below the storm-line, and water started to sheet down the side of the ship, obscuring any sight she might have had of the landing pad. All three of them turned towards the door as hydraulics and pressure equalizers hissed and clanked, and something thumped outside the ship, dull and distant. Some sort of pipeline or tunnel, she guessed, keeping them dry as they disembarked. No fanfare here, unlike her world, and Aleksandr's. This was all military duty, tradition, and only what was required, no more and no less.

Dreary. Empty. No wonder no one smiled as they gathered their things and their staff and headed down the corridor to the spaceport building proper.

They hadn't seen it. Of course they hadn't seen it, they had no perspective from which to see it clearly. He knew what things were supposed to look like, and what they looked like from the drop-ship was not what was supposed to be happening. Far too many boots on the ground. Too many ships in dock, more than should have been constructed in the last several months. And they were new, too. They still shone clean and unscarred by flight. Every available berth and some that must have been constructed recently was full, and the only spots available were the ones usually taken up by commercial transport.

This wasn't the place he had left. There was no war on, they should be scaling back their construction of ships, carrier class, drop ships. Some of them looked like new designs, and he remembered there had been a rumor of arming drop ships before he had left for the treaty signing. But those kinds of things took years in development and paperwork. Surely they hadn't been implemented in a matter of months?

They passed through screening and towards the vehicles, and then came their first reminder that this wasn't like their previous visits to other worlds. Two men with a considerable amount of décor on their lapels and the bars of a Lieutenant came up to him. "Commander. If you'd come with us, we need to debrief you."

It came as a shock to the younger two. Both of them stared at him as though he'd thrown them to a nest of predators, but he nodded. He was still a part of the army, still obedient to the will of his superiors.

Andreas looked over at them, nodded slightly. "Go on, they'll take you to..." His quarters. Only they weren't likely his quarters anymore. "Our quarters," he amended after a second. Not that he had any idea where those would be. He'd had bachelor quarters when he had left but, as with Aleksandr, they must have moved his things to a place more suited to a family. Married personnel sector. Officer's sector. He had no idea where they would put him.

But they would guide Aleksandr and Beata to their husband's quarters, and did, with a last look or two over their shoulders at him.

"This way, Commander." There were a number of small utilitarian rooms off to the side of the docking and check-in area, rooms often used for interrogating suspicious travelers, rarely for debriefings. Andreas wondered if it was on purpose, to give him a bad start, or if they just took it for convenience's sake. He wouldn't have thought that, he realized, before Aleksandr. Or not so immediately, anyway.

They all sat. The older one, the Lieutenant-Commander, took out a small recording device and set it down, reciting the date and time of the interview. "How long have you been married to Beata Kronlokken of the Vandari capital planet Concordia?"

The first few questions, as he'd expected, were rote. How long had he been married to Beata, to Aleksandr, everyone ignoring the slight twitch in the older man's eye as Andreas gave him answers he no doubt didn't expect. Ready, immediate answers. No children as yet, no significant problems, no health issues stemming from his time on other planets. That he knew of, of course. The doctor would have to check him over and certify him healthy and fit to continue.

"What is your impression of the military readiness of Concordia?"

That was a trickier question. Andreas gave it some thought, a small frown, otherwise unmoving. "We never found a reason to visit their shipyards, although I examined their briefs. The King, in agreement with his advisors and his co-monarchs, began disbanding certain wartime units from active duty and relocating them to guard posts along more remote regions of space. Whether or not that actually took place and how many of their wartime units that was, I couldn't say with any degree of certainty."

Which was as much to say as, anyone could falsify a document. Especially when all he had to go on was the strength of his eyes and critical thinking. They nodded, taking note of that.

"And the other?"

It was harder to describe Aleksandr's political situation without the emotion that usually accompanied it when it was just the three of them, sometimes the two of them. "They talk about disarming and standing down, and certainly they seem to have every intention of doing so. But they have no plan, no organization for the mechanism of disarmament and withdrawal from the field, and the bureaucracy inherent in their system of government makes everything very slow to move."

"Why do you think that is?" Pouncing upon the subject of bureaucracy, for a moment. Andreas started to say he didn't have the background to speculate before he thought that maybe they meant the question in a different way.

"Their system of government wasn't designed to be interplanetary. Rather than abolish the system and create a new one, or even increase the scope and organizational capability of the existing system, they assumed that what had worked on a smaller scale would work on a larger. When it threatened to collapsed, they patched it with committees. There are now half a dozen different committees for each of the different departments, all of them overseeing overlapping interests. The number of opportunities for miscommunication is..." Staggering was the word he would have used in casual conversation. "Not insignificant."

Nods from both the Lieutenants. "Is it possible that this is a manufactured excuse to buy more time for another purpose?" Not that either of them would accuse the other country of preparing for or wanting to start another war, but the thought was there. Andreas expected it was in the minds of all the heads of government on all three sides.

"I think... that if they wanted to manufacture an excuse, that they would come up with one that didn't require falsifying piles and piles of forms," he concluded, dry and resigned. He'd waded through those damn forms for at least two days before he'd given up on trying to follow the logic involved in that world's bureaucracy, and even Aleksandr had laughed and apologized for all the paperwork.

"What do you think the chances are that the current regime will stay in power?"

Sideways question. Andreas hadn't expected it, but neither did it seem out of the blue once it was asked. "There didn't seem to be any one faction willing to either master the intricacies of the government to make it work for them or willing to hold out until everyone else caved to their demands. All parties involved seem invested in maintaining the status quo."

"As the status quo currently involves a treaty in our best interest..." Clearly that mutter wasn't supposed to be on the record, but Andreas smiled just a little bit anyway. "All right. What about the monarchy..."

And on and on it went. In endless circles, until it was evening by the time he left the spaceport. He looked out at the night sky streaked with silver where the rain caught the light and wondered how late it was. He hadn't wanted to look at a clock and feel the weight of all those hours.

By the time he got home, to his new home, both of them were in bed. Aleksandr curled around Beata in a bed not quite large enough for three people, he'd have to remember to have that dealt with the next day. Rather than disturb either of them he got something to drink and went to sleep in the guest room. Which, he realized belatedly, might have been the idea all along. Taking a man or a woman as a spouse was a common enough thing, here, but taking both at once? The epitome of moral decay.

He came up with something further along those lines, but was asleep before he could note it down for discussion in the morning.