Southern Cross by Windstar

Emily reminded herself silently, thinking of the hot spots on Earth where she had been forced to
deploy some of her, still precious few, Imperial Marines to keep the peace. Hatred died slowly, if
at all, and she supposed it was inevitable that once the shock got over, that the Tiri would
become targets of their own.
"How were things out there, Mira?"
The small elder woman shrugged elegantly, sipping once more from her glass of tea.
"Not great. The Zz'sstal fell shortly after we did. So did the Al'kar'kim, although it took a bit
longer."
Emily grimaced at that. It had been expected of course, but that still didn't make it easier to hear
the words. Both races had been close allies of the Tiri since the beginning of the war with the
Bak'ra.
"I wish I could have kept in contact."
Emily waved that away, sighing.
"You know as well as I do that we couldn't risk any contact that would have brought the Bak'ra
here before we were ready. I'm impressed that you managed to stay out for this long though. We
feared you dead for a long time now."
Originally, Mira's orders had been to scout for as long as she could, then return. Emily had
thought that would mean the other Guardian would return after a decade, at most.
"How did you survive out there, Mira? Sixty years is a long time to go without parts."
Her old teacher's face creased into a seldom seen smile at that question.
"We stumbled onto a group of refugees from Redwing, and got some parts from them about three
decades ago now. Good thing too, since I was being hunted by an entire Bak'ra battle group at
the time. I can't tell you how good it is to be back though, I was certain we'd never make it back
more than once."
The sheer amount of information Mira had managed to collect on the Bak'ra movements and new
ships were invaluable. The First Guardian only wished that Mira hadn't had to return alone.
"Your crew cleared yet?"
After the bio-engineered Bak'ra plague that had destroyed Tiri Prime and lost them the war, the
protocols for dealing with even possible infectious agents were very strict indeed. The fact that
Mira and her crew had been out scouting for so long and interacting with other species on the far
side of the Galactic rim, didn't help at all either. There was a tension, a brittleness to her friend
that hadn't been there when she'd last seen her.