It took Yamagata many weeks to realize that he felt more than guilt. For the first time in his lives he felt shame. He was ashamed of what he had set in motion. I did not order the attack, he repeated to himself. Still, it was the inevitable consequence of the war that I willingly started.

Unsure of himself for the first time in his life, racked by a sense of shame he had never felt before, Yamagata begged for a private audience with the grand lama, hoping the old man could soothe his inner turmoil.

“There has been a tragedy,” he began, hesitantly.

The grand lama waited for him to continue, sitting in silent patience on the low couch of his chamber, his head shaved bald, his ascetic face bony, hollow-cheeked, his dark mahogany eyes squarely on Yamagata.

“There is a war going on in space,” Yamagata continued. “Far from here. In the Asteroid Belt.”

“Even here, such rumors have been whispered,” said the grand lama, his voice little more than a soft murmur.

“A few days ago more than a thousand people were killed,” Yamagata stumbled on. “Slaughtered. In a space habitat.”

The lama’s lean face went gray.

His heart pounding, Yamagata finally blurted, “It may have been my fault! I may have caused their deaths!”

The grand lama clutched at his saffron robe with both hands. Yamagata thought the old man was having a heart attack. He stood before the lama, stiff with shame and guilt, silent because he had no words to express what he felt.

When at last the grand lama recovered his self-control he looked into Yamagata’s eyes with a stare that pierced to his very soul.

“Do you accept responsibility for these murders?” he asked, his voice now hard as iron.