“I have no idea what you’re talking about, sir.”

“I’m saying you’ll go in there with a dues-paying mentality, thinking you ought to do your time, let those with seniority travel to the stars first. People like your father. Old-timers who respected the chain and expect to be respected in turn, am I right? I’m sure you learned that with mother’s milk.”

Shell says nothing. Why is this guy being disgusting?

“I can send you to the stars in six months, guaranteed.”

“Is this a test?”

“No test, although if we did, I’m sure you’d ace it. I’ve seen your record.”

“What are you asking me to do?”

“Finish your studies, then commit to a trip to one of the colonies under the MaxGalactix banner. Don’t think the prep will be easy. We’ll stretch your considerable intellect and discipline to the limits of your sanity. What will really annoy you is you’ll never get to use what you learn. You’ll be Second Mate to the AI. You won’t have to do anything at all. You’ll be backup, but that just means you’ll sleep for like ten years and wake up on the other side.”

“Unless the AI fails.”

“Ship AIs don’t fail. It’s never happened. In some commonwealths they have been granted personhood without voting rights. In the UK they’re thinking of giving them citizenship status. Theoretically, a ship can become an individual. It’ll never happen, but it shows their degree of confidence that the technology is near-human.”

“Humans fail, sir.”

“They do, don’t they? That’s why we use AI for the interstellar work. Better than human.”

The motto of one company that manufactures them.

But here Shell is, on the Ragtime, with AI failure, and human casualties. Historic. A moment in time that will live in infamy. Her name, eternally linked with her father, will be… the family name, Campion, will always be associated with this.

When she sold her stuff for practically nothing, Fred asked her if she was coming back.

“I don’t know,” she had said. That wasn’t entirely true. She could not imagine being back on Earth after a mission that would be effectively a twenty-year round trip, with the relativity weirdness altering her ageing. She could not see a future for herself in space, either. Did that mean she would settle in a colony? Did she precognitively not expect to survive?

Her hands work the imaginary beads faster.

She hopes Salvo can come up with a workable solution. They need not just call-making but telemetry information, otherwise the shuttles would not be able to rendezvous safely.