A surprise awaited them when they got to the bridge. Lita Generus swiveled around in the pilot’s chair and gave everyone a sloppy salute.

It meant nothing to Narang, of course. But Kemp grinned at Generus. “Did the captain shanghai you?”

She returned the smile and shook her head. “News travels. I heard about Ivan. When I phoned Captain Jennings to talk about it, he informed me that things weren’t completely cut-and-dry. So I re-upped.”

Jennings gave his normal, closed-lipped smile, barely visible under his moustache. “Of course, it’s not a tour as such, but we will be spaceside for a while, and possibly outsystem.”

“Er, what?” Narang looked concerned.

“Outside of the Earth/Moon system,” Kemp said in an aside. “Not outside the solar system. The ship isn’t that good.”

“You might be surprised, Doctor,” the captain said, cryptically. “For the moment, if everyone would grab a seat…”

They took seats in the bridge, after promising not to touch any controls.

Kemp looked around at the impressive array of stations, consoles, panels, and monitors. “You can run this with just the two of you?”

Jennings nodded. “I could run the Getting Ahead by myself. I would never think to do so on an actual mining tour, of course. But the A.I. in the new BG series vessels can, in principle, fly the ship with no human oversight, even follow a specified flight plan with scheduled stops.”

The captain tapped his forehead. “Speaking of which, I’m going to give all of you voice authority for the duration of the voyage. Single points of failure, and all that. I think you’re right, Dr. Kemp, that paranoia is rubbing off on all of us.”

Narang laughed. “It’s not paranoia if they’re really out to get you.”

* * *

“One of the big advantages of the new series long haul vessel,” Captain Jennings said as they moved into the hab ring, “is that you don’t have to spin down the hab ring when you want to maneuver. They specify a maximum maneuvering torque, and it’s pretty light, but unless you’re dodging something, how fast do you really have to change direction?”

Kemp nodded. The constant spinning up and spinning down of the hab ring had been an enormous pain on the Mad Astra. It tended to dictate carefully planned flight vectors, in order to minimize time spent under thrust.

“The ferry pilot mentioned something about you having done some mods. You’re not going to rip the hab ring right off the ship the first time you pour it on, are you?”

Jennings laughed. “No the hab ring can actually withstand far more straight-line strain than even the 4600 nacelles can provide. Even on the Astra, we could technically have accelerated with the hab ring spinning. But if we did suddenly have to maneuver, we’d have popped the hab ring out of its bearings.”