“Enough with the hypotheticals. I know what you’re asking. You want me to lie to about ending my investigation.”

“No.”

“Then what—?”

“I want you to tell the truth about your investigation, which I’ll come back to. What I want you to lie about is the contamination. If we get the antenna back online, could you bring yourself to minimise the contamination from the opened science labs so that we can save nearly a thousand people?”

Fin swallows, more distressed than Shell would have expected.

“I’d still have to complete the investigation,” says Fin.

“Your investigation is over.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m saying there is no longer a need to investigate. I am confessing.”

“What?”

“I, Mission Specialist Michelle Campion, acting Captain of the starship Ragtime, confess to the murders of the passengers.” She looks him right in the eyes. “I did it.”

Chapter Twenty

Bloodroot: Mission Control

Once every lunar month, something Bloodroot colonists call a Scintillation occurs. A hundred or more Lambers flick in and out of existence in the city centre. It starts with two, then others join in. They float less than a foot above ground, teardrop-shaped glowing splotches of cytoplasm trailing tentacles.

Scintillations occur around the Lamber Tower, that focus of repatriation. It’s not really a tower; it’s an antenna of sorts, and, even though the entire colony piggybacks signals on it, the primary purpose is to link with the Lambers’ homespace and send them packing through a portal. Scientists have said from what they can see it is not similar to bridge technology. Though Bloodrooters built it, they did so using specifications provided by the aliens. There are some hints that the entire structure is a resonator, and the antenna alone won’t do the job. Where do they go? What happens to them when they get there? No answers.

If the settlement was planned, no way would the Tower be at the centre. But a colony can be a chaotic thing in the beginning. Ask Nightshade. The lore is that the structure predates its use as an antenna, and people naturally build houses in spirals around it. Alternating arcs of dwellings and tree boulevards, lessons learned from Earth, trying to work with the environment instead of conquering it.

The Tower is visible from Mission Control, although not a single person looks at it as they go about their business. The twinkling of the Scintillations doesn’t turn heads in Mission Control, not even for a group as bored as The Ragtime Team.

They have a pool going while one of them, Demetrius Peole, throws balls of crumpled paper into a waste basket from ten feet. His failures dot the low-friction floor. After each shot, the wager changes. Everyone present knows that Demetrius misses one in ten shots and bets accordingly, which is boring and reduces the probability of any one person winning big.