Varken Rise by Tracy Cooper-Posey

explanations.
    Yet he was simply Bedivere. He looked tired, but that was all. There was no light of madness in his eyes. He was not twitching with psychotic palsy.
    Catherine made herself breathe. Hot tears were building up, although she wouldn’t let him see them. She couldn’t afford to.
    “What are you doing ?” she demanded. “The known worlds think you’ve gone rogue and I don’t know what to think.”
    He held up his hand to halt her tirade. She was done, though. That was the only question to which she wanted an answer. The rest was just details.
    “I know what they’re saying. I’ve been monitoring,” he said quietly. Then his mouth pulled up into a half smile that seemed sad. “You look wonderful, Cat. I wish I could touch you, even just to wipe that tear away.”
    And she realized she was crying, after all. The tears were tracking down her cheeks and her chest felt as if it was in a vise. It was a sob that she was just barely holding in.
    “Bedivere. Please…” Please what? She wasn’t sure what she was asking. Her voice shook.
    He closed his eyes and she saw his chest rise and fall. A heavy sigh.
    Then he opened his eyes and leaned forward, his long fingers threading themselves together. “You have to listen, Cat. I don’t know how long the encryption will hold on this channel and I can’t afford to be exposed.”
    “Listen to what? You know you have to come in, don’t you? You have to explain yourself. Whatever the reason, whatever you did this for…you have to show them you’re not crazy.”
    “I’m not crazy,” he replied. “I just can’t come in yet.”
    “The longer you stay out there, the longer you hide, the worse it looks. And the farms, Bedivere….”
    “I have things to do, things that I must do first.”
    Catherine stared at him. “What things?” she asked helplessly.
    He shook his head. There was pain in his eyes. “I can’t tell you anything, Cat. I can’t explain myself. Please…you have to trust me.”
    Catherine wrapped her arms around herself. “And then what? Sit at home and wait for you to be shot out of the skies? You laid waste to an entire continent, Bedivere! They won’t be able to get near that place for generations. And now you tell me there’s more to come?”
    “You’re getting angry because I won’t give you answers. I understand that—”
    “You’re damn right I’m mad! Nothing you’ve done makes sense. Nothing ! Maybe they’re right, after all.”
    “You believe that I’m a machine gone mad? That I’ve been aping human feelings to trick people? To trick you?”
    “I don’t know what to think! What you’ve done has tied me up into such a box of doubt, I don’t know the way out.”
    “I’m sorry, Cat.”
    “Don’t be sorry! Come home! Explain yourself!”
    Again, he just shook his head in a tired arc.
    All her anger drained, quickly, as if a plug had been pulled. She sagged in the chair, staring at him. “I want to believe you,” she whispered. “I want to believe that you’re doing this for some grand reason.”
    He didn’t answer.
    She closed her eyes. “You’re scaring me.”
    “Then we have that in common,” he said softly, making her look at him again. “I’ve been afraid since the day I found Interspace.”
    “Afraid of what?” She could barely speak past the hard knot in her throat.
    “That because I am not a man, I won’t be enough for the great Catherine Shahrazad. I have been afraid that the novelty would wear off and that one day you would look at me with the expression in your eyes that you have right now.”
    True fear swamped her. Before she could think of what to say to stop the conversation from heading down this awful route, Bedivere reached over to the console she couldn’t see. “Goodbye, Cat.”
    His image disappeared.

Chapter Eight
    Gate Station - Barros IV, Barros System, Aibosian Cluster. FY 10.092.
    Brant found a privateer that would get them back to Sunita in fifteen days. It wasn’t the