"Thought you said you were an Admiral." Not that in Dylan's time there'd be anything for him to be an Admiral in other than some local defence force which would not, in Dylan's mind at least, make him outrank a Captain of the High Guard. "It's not in my pay grade either, but that doesn't seem to stop it happening to me."

After all, he's a man three centuries out of his time. Not that it was, really, strictly time travel, but it was close enough.

Dylan takes a deep breath.

It's not Telemachus Rhade's fault what his ancestor did to him. Not in any other sense than that it was Nitzcheans' fault in general because Gaheris did it because he was a Nietzchean, with Nietzchean values he'd tried to warn Dylan about.

He forces himself to actually look at the guy, look at him and see him, not Gaheris' ghost. If this guy is telling him the truth and he served aboard the Andromeda Ascendant for a year, there must have been something that made Dylan trust him.

Or at least understand him well enough to know how best to make use of him.

"Trust's gotta be earned. But I'll start by not shooting you in the head for something that's nothing to do with you."