Lucky hadn’t thought much about April since he’d gone through the corridor. She was on New Roma, or wherever the Emperor’s palace was these days. The communications array that had allowed for near real-time comms was using a man-made corridor that was gone now. All the corridors on the human side of the Great Corridor were gone now too, thanks to the destruction of the Da’hune home star.

When he did think of her, it was to curse her for making him a sergeant and hand-picking a team for him. It instantly made him a pet project of the Emperor, and that wasn’t a way to make friends with the rest of the kids.

“The Emperor believes it’s critical that we get out in front of the Reds on this,” Tog said, taking the conversational baton.

Lucky nodded. “Even though we have no idea what the Reds are up to?”

Tog nodded. “Even so.”

Lucky was stumped. What was April after? “Am I missing something? So the Reds decided to take a little field trip without telling the rest of us where they were going. Is that a big issue?”

This time, it was Nellis that spoke. “Ordinarily, no. They don’t need our permission. They do need coalition permission, but apparently they got that.” He made a sour face. “They’re a little better at the diplomatic bullshit than we give them credit for.”

“So what’s the problem?” asked Lucky, realizing how flip it sounded after he said it. The way they were all talking freely in here was a little disconcerting. He was still getting used to the idea of talking operations with his bosses rather than just taking orders.

This time it was Nellis who pulled up a visual on the cube display. Lucky could see several hundred red dots buzzing around in the display. Lucky guessed what they were. “The Cardinal Order fleet?”

Nellis nodded. “Most of it. About 400 ships, all located in their local zone. A dozen carrier groups. This is the view from yesterday, mind you.” He waved his hand. “And this is the view today.”

There were less than half the dots remaining. Lucky stared in shock. Short of open hostility, Lucky couldn’t imagine the Empire moving that many ships that fast. The logistics alone were mindboggling.

“Are you saying—”

Nellis nodded. “Most of their fleet,” he said as he reset the cube to the previous view. “Off to the middle of nowhere.”

Orso pursed her lips. “It’s not actually the middle of nowhere, not anymore,” she said. “The Reds sent a small mission there a few weeks ago. Nothing that stood out. Nothing that we even noticed except in hindsight. We assumed it was a survey team looking for minerals. Hell, we have a bunch of teams just like it ourselves. There was nothing special about it.”

Lucky nodded. “But?”

“But it never came back,” said Orso. “And they don’t need half their fleet to go find a missing survey team.”