Skylar had been leaning on the back of Rico’s chair. Now she straightened. “So that would make your brother, Devlin Starke?”
He nodded, looking wary.
“Wow.” Skylar sounded impressed, and Tannis dug in her mind for anything she could remember about the name but came up blank.
“Wow?” she asked.
“Devlin Starke is about the most wanted man on the Corps’s most-wanted-men list. He’s a legend. Supposed to be a real hard bastard.”
“He’s had to be hard.” The Trog sounded defensive. “Our parents were killed by the Church—”
“They were GMs?” Tannis asked. She couldn’t see any sign of obvious genetic engineering in the Trog, but some just didn’t show and were able to hide what they were.
“Our mother was—that was enough for the bastards. Dev was only fourteen. I was six. He looked after me.”
“He also apparently went after the Church’s extermination squad and killed every last one of them,” Skylar added. “My God—he was only fourteen—that wasn’t in the files.”
“They deserved to die,” the Trog said, his tone harsh.
“Hey, I doubt you’ll get anyone arguing with that here. What was your mother’s GM mix?”
“She was part jaguar. It was obvious in her, and in Dev. Not so much in me though, which made it easier to hide. I don’t remember her that well, so I was never as bitter as Dev. Anyway, after he’d killed the Church’s people, he went in search of the Coalition and told them he wanted to join. He made it his whole life, dedicated himself to destroying the Church, and he rose quickly through the ranks.”
“And where did he stand on killing little children?” Alex asked.
“He was against it. He’s a good man.”
“Hmm.” Tannis knew you had to be ruthless to get to the top of an organization like the Coalition. Ruthless and dedicated. “Have you been in touch with your brother?”
“Not for ten years. But that won’t matter. He told me to come back when I was ready.”
“And are you ready?” Tannis asked.
“I was never very interested in the fighting. It was always engines that interested me.” A smile flickered across his face. “You know, Dev’s a brilliant engineer as well, but he got a little sidetracked—he taught me everything. Then I made the explosive device that blew up those children, and that act made us as bad as them. I couldn’t stay. But I do believe the Church has to be stopped.” The Trog glanced at Janey and shrugged. “Am I ready to go back? The truth is—I don’t know.”
Janey crossed to him and laid a scarlet nailed hand on his arm. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“It was as much mine as anyone’s.”
The look that passed between the two of them was interesting, but Tannis decided she would think about it later. Right now she needed to work out if this was a legitimate plan, or whether it was likely to get them all killed.
“But your brother is still dedicated to the cause?”
“As far as I know. I doubt he’ll ever give it up—he hates the Church.” He cast a glance toward Callum. Tannis followed his gaze. Callum still appeared a little green, but he looked a lot better than when he’d first arrived. “Dev hates the Collective as well. He says they’re as responsible as the Church for the purge.”
“How does he figure that?” Tannis asked.
“The Collective allowed the GMs to be downgraded to nonhuman status, which allowed the Church to kill us without legal repercussions, and they did nothing to stop the purge.”
Callum sat absolutely still in his seat, his expression blank, but he didn’t defend himself or the Collective.
“Yeah well, perhaps their leader was too busy to know what was going on,” Tannis suggested. “No doubt, you weren’t important enough for his illustrious attentions, and he delegated. I’ve heard he does that a lot.”
“Dev said one thing at a time, first the Church and then the Collective.”
“Hmm, so do you think he will help us? Maybe he’d like to see Trakis Seven destroyed.”
“Maybe. But he’d rather blow a few of the Church’s ships into space dust. Plus, if what he”—he waved a hand at Callum—“says is right and Meridian is finished, then it doesn’t matter, does it?”
That was true. “Okay, so how do we do this?”
“I have a code we set up when I left. I need to send it out and hopefully he should answer me straightaway.” He sat at one of the consoles and Janey stood at his side, one hand resting on his shoulder.
Tannis forced herself to relax. She sat down but couldn’t prevent her foot tapping on the floor, her fingers drumming on the arm of the chair, while she waited. She cast a sidelong glance at Callum, just as he leaned forward and picked up Rico’s bottle, topping off his glass. He caught her gaze and held out the bottle.
“Why not?”
He filled her glass and pushed it toward her.
“Anything yet?” she asked the Trog.