I feed my own systems out like a jockey waking a machine. Like there’s nothing out of place.

I send my voice across the net. “Present,” I tell the shell, the word as steady as I can make it. “Present yourself.”

The Juno stands tall, but it can’t make those lenses work. It doesn’t respond to my requests for operator access. I watch it tense, that hand still sheltered near its chest.

“Present,” I repeat, loud and clear. My heart beats itself against my ribs.

The Juno takes a massive step. Glass falls from its shattered eyes.

“Present.”

Something heavy shifts across the net. Handshakes and ciphers, the kind you might expect one shell to send to another. It isn’t a conversation. Not quite.

There aren’t any words, but I know what the shell is trying to do. I understand.

What are you?

I fight the urge to look back at Hail and Lear. They must be most of the way to the plug by now. I swallow.

“Your operator,” I say. “Present your cockpit lock.”

The Juno watches me. One fist unfolds.

Another cluster of code flows out on the net. Requests, queries.

Am I broken?

“Yes. Your optics are damaged.”

It considers this, turns its palm over in the light.

I can see what it’s been holding. A little sparkle of glass.

The machine peers at the remains of an eye. What little it could save.

“Use mine.”

The Juno looks up.

I open the connections to my helmet optics, rethink, and open everything. I kill the firewalls on my central systems and clear the encryption on my thoughts. It’s what a jockey would do for their machine, and so I do it.

It’s the most difficult part of this job.

The shell will give you eyes, but you have to trust them. It’ll give you fists and fire, and feet that’ll walk through hell, but you have to let it keep the balance. It’ll give you wings, and in return, you have to let it into you.

I’m not special. I made lower-middle in boot-camp, and sure as hell didn’t set any records, but this is one thing I’ve always been good at. While the others had to dose to find connection, had to tug and fight and dig their spurs, I’ve never had trouble sharing the inside of my head.

It feels like coming home.

The Juno watches my systems unfold themselves across the net, open and vulnerable. It reaches for one connection: a little camera in the join between visor and helmet. The machine doesn’t touch anything else.

A small light flashes green in the corner of my eye. New connection established, says my visor. Streaming to remote device.

The Juno is very still.