We skip across a rail yard, between the cars of a massive train, but we don’t board. There’s a backlog. A Decatur lies on a flatbed, its feet peeking out from under an oil-stained tarpaulin. One of its hands has broken free of the rigging and dragged across the rails next door, leaving white scars across the steel. A crew of knuckledraggers is wheeling a crane around to lift it back into place.

We don’t take that train, or any other, but pick our way between the rails, catching a cargo-lift as it passes our level. It’s an open platform, wide enough that the Juno could stand in the middle with its arms outstretched.

A group of NorCol overalls watch us from between a cluster of walking loaders, passing comments we can’t quite hear. Hail glares downrange, and they turn back to their smokes and bickering.

“What’s their problem?” asks Lear, flexing his fists. “Don’t like jockeys on their deck?”

Hail spits. “Jockeys aren’t a problem, convicts are.”

It’s the same when we clear the lift, sixteen floors up. A checkpoint wants our IDs and an explanation. It happens again when a NorCol jacket and his troopers pull us over, wanting to know what we’re doing so far from the hangars.

Hail waits for them to drift out of earshot before she explains. “We’re the bottom of the ladder. To the regulars, we’re worse than the stiffs who work the bilge lines. At least they have the sense to stay out of sight.”

“Why?” I ask. “There must be cons all over this ship.”

“There are, but didn’t used to be. Used to be all professional.”

“But now we’re the ones who get the fighting done?” asks Salt.

“They don’t replace the full-timers on this ship any more, and the original units are too small for live ops. They’re spectators now, for the most part.”

He smiles broadly. “Nothing like watching from the sidelines.”

I chuckle at that. “They’re jealous of cons? Christs.”

“That isn’t all of it.” Hail ducks under a security boom that hasn’t moved in so long the rust has gummed it shut. She waits while we follow her in through the dust. “There aren’t that many full-time jockeys left. Chances are, if you see a shell walking around, there’s a con in the saddle.”

“So what? A jockey’s a jockey.”

She shakes her head. “It isn’t easy knowing someone who was in a chain-gang just a week ago could literally crush you under a thumb.”

“So why don’t you?” asks Lear, with a nasty grin. “They can only arrest you again.”

“It’s tempting,” says Hail, not looking back, “but NorCol’s got a couple of monsters on payroll, for moments just like that.” She stops us short. “Here we are.”

Lear squints into the dark. “If you say so.”