‘You want me to set you free – and then give you your own gnat?’ Greta was incredulous. When word had reached her that Ramiro had a proposal that he would only put to her in person, she must have envisioned a deal in which he testified against a former comrade or two in exchange for a lighter punishment. ‘How could you imagine anyone agreeing to that?’

Ramiro said, ‘If you want to get rid of this problem, you need to get rid of the dissenters. But you can’t expect people to leave the Peerless behind until they know that they can survive somewhere else. I’m willing to travel to the nearest substantial orthogonal body and find out if it can be made habitable.’

A flicker of amusement crossed Greta’s face. ‘The nearest substantial body is almost certainly the Object. Are you going to try to sell people on the idea that they were inside that rock, unnoticed, living their lives backwards — while the last three generations of their ancestors were coming and going, taking samples from the surface?’

Ramiro hadn’t thought of the Object. But as satisfying as it would be to set foot on the very rock that had once threatened to annihilate him, the prospect of burrowing into it didn’t sound much like liberation, even without the bizarre twist of having to stay hidden from all the earlier visitors. ‘I meant something large enough to hold on to an atmosphere, so people could live on the surface. Something on the outskirts of the orthogonal cluster. I don’t have access to the astronomers’ catalogues, but there must be something planet-sized within reach.’

‘Within reach?’ Greta was doubtful; she paused to make use of her corset. ‘The nearest orthogonal planet would entail a round trip of a dozen years.’

Ramiro had hoped for something closer, but he persisted. ‘A dozen for the passengers,’ he stressed. ‘But still only four years for you. We could make it even less if it really mattered; I’m sure I could put up with the higher acceleration. But we’ll need to talk to the experts as to whether the cooling system would allow that.’

Greta said, ‘ “We”? You might be getting a bit ahead of yourself.’

Ramiro looked down at the hardstone fetter piercing the side of his abdomen. In the room’s low gravity, he hardly noticed it – unless he moved without thinking and the chain that joined it to the wall became taut. ‘How else should I talk, when I know that I have no chance of doing this without you? I think we’d still make a good team.’

‘Oh, I’m getting all nostalgic now,’ Greta replied sardonically. ‘Let’s reminisce about the time you lied to my face and betrayed me.’