“So what do we do?” snarls the Werewolf. She turns her glare on me. “First you let her in here—”

“She’s clean,” says Jerea, little more than a whisper. “Her readings are strange, but she’s clear of anything we can test for.” She steps closer, puts her palms on the table. “There are only two cases of it transferring to wetware, and both are under control.”

“It spreads through contact,” says Locke. “And they touched her. I’ve seen the footage.”

“We all have,” says King.

“So how do we know she hasn’t turned?”

“Her vitals are human standard,” says Jerea, “and her systems are clean. I will vouch for her, and so will anyone who’s examined her.”

“She assaulted two of your crew. Damaged one.”

“She did, and I don’t like it; I don’t like patching up my own nurses either. But that’s nothing I haven’t seen before. Jockeys do strange things when they’ve been flying a while.”

“And you?” This to Andrade. “You’re allowing this?”

“I am.”

“You’re protecting her?”

“That is correct.”

“And you’d have to go through me,” says Salt, “if you were planning any different.”

Locke casts about the room, but every face is set. “You are all insane.”

“The world has gone insane,” says Mer Sah. “We adapt.”

The Werewolf fumes for a few heartbeats more, but another scan around the room doesn’t help her cause. She turns on her heel and storms off.

Andrade waits until she’s cleared our little bridge. “Took her long enough.”

The old soldier chuckles at that. “Thought she was gonna hold out, if I’m honest. Make us pay for all our sins.”

“We’d be here all day,” says Mer Sah. She sets her eyes on me. “You, jockey. Your crew called this thing a ‘flood.’”

I look back at Hail and Salt. They look back at me, solid and permanent. “That’s because it is one.”

The knuckledragger nods. “It’s a good name. Christs know we’re having a hard time keeping ourselves afloat—”

“But it didn’t drown you,” says King, finishing the thought. “Why?”

I push myself straight, but I don’t have to hold it; Hail rests a hand between my shoulders.

“It almost did.”

“The fact remains that it didn’t, despite several exposures,” Sah rumbles. “Tell us why.”

“My machine—” I nod at the Juno, not that anyone else can see it. “My machine—”

Our machine.

Us.

“—was one of the original awareness testers. Civil war era. It still has some of that left.”

“It’s alive?” asks Mer Sah, an eyebrow creeping up behind her fringe. The tilt in her voice tells us exactly what she means by ‘alive.’ Not some knuckledragger’s metaphor for the creaks in their equipment, or the little tweaks and odd tolerances that change from one machine to another just like it. Alive.

She eyes me. “Y’ve seen it?”