“How can an AI be unhappy when it’s doing exactly what it was made to do?” asked Station Administrator Celar. Not, thankfully, how it could possibly matter whether an AI was happy or not. And then, demonstrating that she had not been given her office merely on the strength of her looks, Station Administrator Celar said, “But you say we’ve prevented Station from doing that. That is the substance of what you’ve said, yes?” She sighed. “When I arrived, my predecessor depicted the Undergarden as a morass of crime and squalor, that no one could find a way to safely clear out. Everything I saw seemed to indicate she was right. And it had been that way so long, fixing it seemed impossible. Everyone agreed it was so. But that’s no excuse, is it. It’s my responsibility.”

“Repair the section doors,” I said. “Fix the plumbing and the lights.”

“And the ventilation,” said Station Administrator Celar, fanning herself briefly with one blue-gloved hand.

I gestured agreement. “Confirm the current occupants in their places. Just for a start.” Getting Medical here, and Security patrols that would not cause more problems than they might solve, would be next, and more difficult.

“Somehow, Fleet Captain, I don’t think it could possibly be that simple.”

Likely not. But. “I couldn’t say. But we have to do something.” I saw her notice that we. “And now I need to speak to you about your daughter Piat.” Station Administrator Celar frowned in puzzlement. “She and Citizen Raughd are lovers?”

Still the frown. “They’ve been sweethearts since they were children. Raughd grew up downwell, and Piat often went down to visit, and keep her company. Not many other children Raughd’s age in the family, at the time. Not in the mountains, anyway.”

Downwell. Where Station couldn’t see more than trackers. “You like Raughd,” I said. “It’s a good connection, and she’s very charming, isn’t she.” Station Administrator Celar gestured assent. “Your daughter is very subdued. Doesn’t talk to you much. Spends more time in other households than home with you. You feel, perhaps, she’s driven you away.”

“What are you aiming at, Fleet Captain?”

Even if Station had seen the way Raughd treated Piat when she thought no one was looking, it wouldn’t have reported it directly. On a station, privacy was paradoxically both nonexistent and an urgent necessity. Station saw your most intimate moments. But you always knew Station would never tell just anyone what it saw, wouldn’t gossip. Station would report crimes and emergencies, but for anything else it would, at most, hint here or guide there. A station household could be, in some ways, very self-contained, very secret, even though living at close quarters with so many others. Even though every moment it was under Station’s constant, all-seeing eye.