To Sleep in a Sea of Stars

The starboard hold has a variety of passengers, who seem more like refugees. A woman asks Kira how much they are charging her for transportation. Kira is shocked, as doing so is illegal in a rescue situation and they are charging double what such a trip would normally cost. The woman calls herself Inarë and has cryptic wisdom to share with Kira about finding one’s path.

With the contact lenses that Vishal gave her, Kira is able to access the network. The first thing she does is locate the alien ships. She can feel a faint pull from their ships, but they are not receiving the same from the xeno, so they do not know where she is. Next, she looks for news about Weyland, her home planet, but the aliens have been jamming communications. The rest of the Adra team has made it safely back to Sol, and she wants to get in touch but does not to avoid revealing her location to the UMC. 

Kira is researching the Jellies, whose technology is at least a hundred years ahead of theirs, when the xeno breaks into her thoughts. She has a vision of three beings, all different, but being born and surviving. Kira wonders if the xeno is purposely communicating or if the images she was viewing have triggered its memories. As she researches the aliens, the xeno keeps sending her information, but it is too cryptic for her to understand.

Nobody knows where the aliens are coming from or why they are attacking because no one can understand their language, which means that Kira, because of the xeno, is the only human who can communicate with them. Kira decides to approach two Entropists who are in the hold, thinking they may have insight into the xeno. The Entropists are a human collective that are more scientifically advanced than other humans and are stateless, meaning they do not belong to The League. She asks about the possibility of an organic skinsuit, but they do not have answers for her.

When Kira finally falls asleep that night, she dreams of her family, and when she wakes, she knows that her purpose is to use her understanding of the Jellies’ language to broker peace, or to help The League win the war. She decides she will ask Falconi to divert to a port that has some Jelly tech that she can examine or an abandoned Jelly ship so she can begin learning about them.

The next morning, Kira finds a mining station with a UMC presence, and she may be able to convince them to take her to a nearby Jelly ship. She asks Gregorovich if she can meet with Falconi and within minutes a crew member, Sparrow, arrives to escort her to Falconi’s cabin, which features a rare bonsai tree. Kira gives her real name to Falconi, Nielsen, and Sparrow and tells them that her skinsuit is actually an alien organism. Gregorovich verifies her identity, but when she asks Falconi to divert the ship and drop her at the mining station, he only agrees on the condition that she let Vishal fully examine her. Kira attempts to reveal a patch of skin so Vishal can draw blood but is unable to do so. Vishal does not understand how the xeno works but tells Falconi that the xeno does not appear to be an immediate threat. Falconi orders her to be moved to a cabin and invites her to join the crew for dinner.

In her cabin, Kira takes off her jumpsuit and looks in the mirror for the first time since Adra. She is very thin, and the sight of her body enclosed in the xeno is distressing. In bed, she practices revealing her skin, and it gets easier as she and the xeno understand each other better. Gregorovich, who, as ship’s mind, can communicate with anyone onboard at any time, asks her about her secrets, but when she says she is afraid and alone, he does not continue the conversation.

At dinner, Kira tells the crew her story and that the xeno does not like the Jellies. They theorize that the same aliens who built the Great Beacon are responsible for the xeno. At the end of the meal, they receive word that four Jelly ships are bound for Malpert, the mining station they are scheduled to drop Kira at tomorrow.

The crew have some information about the Jellies, including that their ships have birthing pods capable of generating new Jellies. Falconi decides they will hide on an asteroid until the aliens leave and agrees to get Kira onto a damaged Jelly ship after the battle. When she goes back to her cabin, Gregorovich asks her to play a game, but she says no, still not trusting that the ship’s mind is sane.

That night, Kira dreams of a being called Ctein. She feels fear at the name once she wakes and realizes that the fear is coming from the Soft Blade. The xeno is warning her, but she does not understand. She and the crew watch the battle on the ship’s monitors. In the end, three Jelly ships are destroyed and a fourth badly damaged. Falconi orders his crew to head toward the damaged Jelly ship, using the excuse of salvage to get Kira on board.

The crew arm themselves and decide that Kira will stay behind until they are sure there are no Jellies onboard, as the aliens might recognize her xeno. As they get closer to the alien ship, Kira can feel the pull from the xeno increase. Finally, they dock the Wallfish alongside the damaged Jelly ship.