Vek pulled the pistol from his gown. It was small, but it felt heavy and strange in his hand. Koln looked at the pistol as he levelled it at her. Shock pulled her mouth wide.

‘Cast off,’ he said. He saw anger flush red into her face.

Something huge exploded in a starburst of blue and white beyond the dome above. Koln flinched, and nodded.

‘All stations, make ready to cast off. Begin the count.’

‘There are still people crossing in the dock limbs,’ called one of the junior officers.

‘Sound the disconnection alarms,’ said Koln, ‘they will run if they want to live.’

Vek could see anger hardening in Koln as she gave the orders. She would never forgive him for what she was having to do. If she found the courage, she might one day try to kill him for it. If they survived the next five minutes, he could live with that.

‘Reactor output rising to sixty per cent,’ called Chi-32-Beta. Out of all the crew, the enginseer seemed the least concerned about the events unfolding around them. Hunched and swathed in her robes of patchwork red and dirty-white, she moved between the bridge systems as though there was no hurry in the world. The rest of the crew were scrambling to get wired into their posts, shouting orders or questions.

‘All systems confirm ready to cast off,’ called Koln. The replies came, rattling off loud, tension finding an outlet in noise.

‘Engines, aye!’

‘Helm, aye!’

‘Auspex, aye!’

On and on. The hull was vibrating now as cold machines woke in its guts. The Antius was a small ship, barely a third of a kilometre from stern to prow. Most of its bones and skin had been hauled from a wreck-drift and remade by skilled hands now long dead and forgotten. It was neither fast or slow, but it had reliably moved indentured labour and ore between Uranus’ moons and asteroid belts for centuries. It had stood up to pirates and survived a conquest that had been renamed ‘compliance’. Now Vek hoped she would prove to be the survivor again.

Koln turned.

‘There are still people running along the dock limbs towards the ship. We can’t cast off.’

‘Give the order,’ snapped Vek. And if you truly listen, Lord and Master of Mankind, he said in his thoughts, have mercy on me for this.

Sweat beaded on Koln’s sagging cheeks and hung from her chin.

‘Seal all doors and hatches,’ she said. Lights flashed on consoles. Quiet had fallen across the bridge as suddenly as the falling of an axe. A junior officer looked up at Koln and nodded. ‘Release anchor cradle, release docking limbs.’

Koln looked back at Vek, fire in her eyes again, lips pulling back from teeth to spit whatever she was about to say.