Four hundred kilometres above planetary surface, the Ragtime races at twenty-eight thousand kilometres per hour, matched by the Lagos team, the Rowdy latched on to the fore torus and the Pica keeping time. Unseen by the naked eye, the altitude starts to drop, the velocity decreasing.

Explosive bolts pop silently in space, starting with Torus 1. It detaches from the truss, which itself splits off into nodes.

The foremost section containing the airlocks, and made of three nodes, is attached to the Equivalence and the Decisive. It lives intact.

The Rowdy starts to fire burns, drawing away the intact torus from the main mass before the cascade of detachment gets that far.

The other Ragtime torus at first seems to be disintegrating, but it is breaking into lifepods. The pods have no navigation and drift in all directions, inertia holding them together before other forces shear them off. A large percentage of them are drawn into Bloodroot’s gravitational well, where many cannot maintain a favourable re-entry angle and bounce off the atmosphere. Some stay in orbit, others carom off, breaking free, bound for parts unknown. There are collisions, to be sure; brief, undramatic. Others fall to Bloodroot, tragically burning up. Still others accidentally enter at the right angle and deploy parachutes – unfortunately, to uninhabited sectors of the planet.

Those who die go quietly, sleeping their sleep, dreaming their chosen dream, until, sooner or later, the light of their existence is extinguished.

The Decisive breaks free from the Ragtime.

Chapter Thirty-four

Decisive: Lawrence

“Go into the Ragtime node. Close off the airlock. I think Brisbane is going to make them ram us again, so I’m going to engage, buy you and the rest some escape room.”

“Action Governor,” Joké says. Subdued. The first time he has ever seen her truly serious.

“I’ll be all right. I’m just going to distract them with fancy flying. The Decisive is useless here, anyway. Ion thrust won’t work in atmo, which we are about to hit.”

She says nothing more, unlatches herself and hugs him. No body warmth through the suit, but he feels it.

“Go on, girl. You’re wasting time.”

She is gone and Lawrence feels parts of her lingering; tendrils of spirit, Lamber magic.

He detaches and orients with quick burns, then heads for the Pica.

At first, he doesn’t know he’s been hit. A glancing blow from a detached pod that spins the smaller ship about and makes Lawrence dizzy. He puts his helmet on. All indicators red. The second and third collisions, he anticipates. The space around what’s left of the Ragtime is like an asteroid field. Definitely a fuel leak somewhere. Right. There are worse ways to die and worse places. Joké, I love you.

“Decisive! Decisive, come in,” says Shell.

“Hello, Ragtime One.”

“Get out of there, we can still—”