The Entropists again inclined their heads, and then Trig led them off to the cabin where they would be staying.

“You have enough cryo tubes?” Kira asked.

“We do now,” said Falconi.

After a flurry of final preparations, the door to the starboard hold was closed and Gregorovich announced in his usual, demented way: “This is your ship mind ssspeaking. Please make sssure all your belongings are sssafely stored in the overhead compartmentsss. Lash yourself to the massst, me hearties: decoupling commencing, RCS thrusting impending. We’re off to parts unknown to tweak the nose of fate.”

Kira headed to Control, slipped into one of the crash chairs, and strapped herself down. The rest of the crew was there, save Hwa-jung—who was still down in engineering—and Sparrow—who was recovering in sickbay. The Entropists were in their cabin, and Alpha Squad was in the port hold, still locked into their exos.

As the Wallfish’s RCS thrusters gently pushed them away from Malpert, keeping its tail end pointed away from the station to avoid frying the dock with residual radiation from the rocket’s nozzle, Kira sent a text to Falconi:

<How did you convince everyone to say yes to this? – Kira>

<It took some doing, but they know what’s at stake. Besides, we’re getting antimatter, pardons, a shot at finding alien tech no one else has seen before. We’d be dumb to turn this down. – Falconi>

<Nielsen didn’t seem too happy about it. – Kira>

<That’s just how she is. I’d be surprised if she were happy jetting off into the unknown. – Falconi>

<What about Gregorovich? – Kira> If he’d disagreed, Kira couldn’t see how Falconi would have been able to take the Wallfish anywhere.

The captain’s fingers started tapping the side of his leg. <He seems to believe it’ll be great fun. His words. – Falconi>

<Don’t take this the wrong way, but has Gregorovich ever gotten a psych evaluation? It’s mandatory for ship minds, isn’t it? – Kira>

Across the room, she saw Falconi make a subtle face. <Yup. Every six months(ish)—real time—once they’re installed in a new ship and then every year after that, assuming their results are stable.… We were up against a deadline when we rescued Gregorovich, so it took a while before we got into dock. He’d settled down by then, enough to pass the tests. – Falconi>

<He passed?! – Kira>

<With flying colors. And every one after that. – Falconi> He gave her a sideways glance. <I know what you’re thinking, but ship minds get graded differently than you or I. Their ‘normal’ is broader than ours. – Falconi>

She chewed on that for a moment. <What about a psychiatrist? Has Gregorovich seen anyone to help him with what he went through, being stranded on that moon? – Kira>

A faint snort from Falconi. <Do you know how many psychiatrists are qualified to deal with ship minds? Not. Many. Most of them are in Sol, and most of them are ship minds themselves. YOU try analyzing a ship mind and see how far you get. They’ll pick you apart and put you back together without you even realizing. It’s like a three-year-old trying to play chess with a pseudo-intelligence. – Falconi>