'To your place!' The domina reared up to her full height. Her loose robe parted a moment, allowing a glimpse of the metal canisters attached to her chest like so many swine at the teat. The cylinders rattled across a patchwork of copper cabling and plasteel plates, the things inside fed by a tangle of wires and tubes. She snatched her gown back across them. 'The second shift is due to commence its descent into the middle reaches, and they are waiting for our support. Impatiently Waiting.'

'Once again, my apologies, domina,' said Cawl. He sent Tez-Lar away to his own station with a pulsed thought code.

Aspertia Sigma-Sigma swept off, mechadendrites waving around her shoulders like serpents ready to strike.

'Provost Acquisitor Mu-Nine-Nine, we are ready to provide escort.'

A steel-faced adept appeared on a floating pict screen, painted in shades of blue and heavily banded with image writing lines. All the viewers on the station were of that type. Their projection elements were made of semi-living light-emitting diodes whose chemistry was harvested from deep sea bacteria. This form of display resisted the radioactive squalls of the system best.

Cawl had learned how to make the displays during a brief stint working for a Lexmechanic Imagificatio. It was amazing what one could pick up in a place like Trisolian.

Extraction Protection Operations was a five-tiered room fronted by a massive, semi-circular window looking down on Etrian. At the left edge of the view Heptaligon Station Quarta was visible as an oblate, steely mirror reflecting the planet's glow. The tether-tube holding it out from the moon was a needle of light. At the bottom of the window the crusted surface of Momus lurked. The sun bathed everything in a snowfield glare so harsh it was painful to look upon.

The tiers of the room were full of control decks for the protection automata, and each one was lavishly supplied with imaging equipment that shone with the same, uncompromising light. Cawl hurried down three flights of stairs to his station and slipped into the uncomfortable chair. Tri-d light weaves popped up around him. A miniature hololith flicked on directly in front of his face. Status readouts for the three drones under his command activated as the desk sensed his presence. Auto-prayers burbled from its speakers as the machine self-blessed.

The drones were presented as red, outline schematics, their outer surfaces rendered translucent to show the condition of the subsystems beneath their armour. Automaton One's port engines glowed a troubling orange.

Cawl tutted. He had been told Automaton One had been repaired. He glanced back at the domina. She was engaged in conversation with the provost acquisitor. Her primary hands were still twitching with annoyance. Now was not the time to bring it up.