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  “We had some, ah, trouble.” The deacon clasped his hands. He had long fingers. “We had plenty of spare cams and motors but not enough bodies to attend to all the chores, so Father Gould—our artificer-engineer—improvised some remotes. But that’s of no matter. Have you much experience of attending to the needs of the Fragile?” he asked. His voice was soft and slightly hoarse.

  “I’m afraid not, not as such. But I’ve been on Hector. They’ve got Fragile there: I even know—knew—some socially. I’m willing to learn.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” He stared at me, face giving nothing away. “I gather you want to work your way inward toward Shin-Tethys.”

  “Yes.”

  More of that unnerving stare. “What do you think of what you have seen of our chapel?”

  “It’s very, uh, picturesque,” I tried. “Beautifully maintained and clean and totally, um, focused on serving the needs of the, uh . . . um . . . passengers . . .” I ran out of words and forced myself to stop speaking.

  “They’re all dead, you know.” Dennett separated his hands briefly, then laced his fingers together. They reminded me of the sculpted air-lock wheel: long and bony. “All of them.”

  “Oh no! Are they supposed to be?”

  “‘Behold the way and the mortification of the flesh.’” The deacon sighed heavily. “No, they’re not. Keeping the Fragile spark of life burning in the endless dark is harder than you might imagine. We did very well for the first hundred and sixty years after the Cathedral dropped us off: The suspension tanks performed brilliantly, the Gravid Mother delivered fresh broods like clockwork to replace those culled by cancer and radiation damage, and the mission was going well—right up until the unfortunate incident with the micrometeoroid and the chlorine-trifluoride tank. The Fragile are not built to withstand exposure to hot hydrofluoric acid and hard vacuum, Ms. Alizond; it was a tragedy. Complete, utter, and total tragedy.” He wrung his hands.

  “But you’re still heading in-system toward Shin-Tethys?” I asked.

  “It is our divinely ordained duty to spread Fragile Humanity to every planet, so that the children of Adam may eventually find their new Eden and prosper therein. After the accident, I diverted to Taj Beacon so that we might borrow their hotline and petition the Cathedral for guidance. It is the archbishop’s penance upon us that we deliver our passengers’ mortal remains to a water burial, thereby discharging our mission. New seed has already been taken on board from the beacon station’s vault, the Gravid Mother has largely recovered from her nervous breakdown, and we will in due course impregnate her and restart the project . . .”

  He paused and stared into my eyes, searching for some spark of understanding. “Will you help us?”

  “I”—I flapped my jaw for a moment—“well, I have business on Shin-Tethys”—best not to be specific—“but I’d be happy to work my passage, to the best of my abilities, of course”—a thought struck me—“but I suppose you had a complete crew when you set out? What happened to them? Why are you looking for a spare set of hands?”

  “It was the accident.” The deacon shook his head slowly. “It didn’t just kill our Fragile charges; everyone who was in the chapel at the time was injured or destroyed. The priestess in charge of our mission, Lady Cybelle—burned alive! Also our engineer-mechanical and our doctor and the choirmaster—all charred to the marrow! Two more, brothers of my lineage, died fixing the radiation leak after the meltdown. We recovered their soul chips, of course, but they were in questionable condition . . . and there was other damage. The Gravid Mother was traumatized, and Father Gould, our artificer-engineer, is overworked and overloaded. This is not a numerous mission. There were few enough of us to begin with. It should be no surprise that the faith of some of the survivors was severely shaken: Three have opted to stay behind on Taj—”

  “So you’re shorthanded? Just how bad is it? Who’s left?”

  Dennett looked uncomfortable. “Just me! Well, I’m the only fully operational line officer. Cook and the Gravid Mother chose to persevere, after some persuasion, as did some of the maintenance mechas and Father Gould. And our high priestess, the Lady Cybelle, is regenerating and will be fully herself sometime after departure. But I’m the only ordained officer of the Church currently operational. However, I am not on my own. I’m wearing both my brothers’ soul chips! I just need a few spare brains from time to time to help manage the remotes. We—he—I can’t split my attention too much. Father Gould is running eight of the remotes simultaneously, and he’s barely able to function. Which is why we need more hands.”

  The picture was becoming clear, and it wasn’t a good one. The Church of the Fragile had a long-standing mission to spread the seed of our ancestral species to the stars. Sometime ago—a couple of centuries past—one of their peripatetic interstellar cathedrals passed within a light-year of Dojima System. Accordingly, a small chapel was put overboard, crewed by a volunteer ministry, shepherding a small cargo of Fragiles and an incubator to manufacture replacements. Ancestors only know what they meant to do when they arrived at Shin-Tethys, but at some point during the long deceleration burn, the chapel ate a micrometeoroid, which did bad things to its structural integrity. (Bad things involving corrosives and a reactor meltdown.)

  “So you need hands that can be left to get on with unskilled jobs without supervision.” I licked my lips. “But you’re the only officer left, aren’t you? The only person who knows how to run the chapel? Doesn’t that put the vehicle at some risk if anything were to happen to you?”

  “No!” he answered slightly too fast. “The priestess . . . as I said, we recovered her soul chips. At Taj Beacon, we purchased all the necessary parts of a new body for her, from structural chassis to techné. She lies in the crypt now, integrating new flesh on her bones while her soul chip unpacks in her new brain. As I said, she is regenerating.”

  But didn’t you just say the soul chips were damaged? I kept this thought to myself. Best case, the priestess would wake up in a month or two, and we’d have a responsible adult in charge. The Church wouldn’t trust a planetary mission to an incompetent, or to someone they wanted to get rid of, would they? But the worst case was that what woke up might be a few million mechaneurons short of a full set. It clarified my position: from questionable to foolhardy in one easy step.

  I folded my arms defensively. “So, let me summarize? You need spare hands to do the easy stuff while you fly the chapel toward Shin-Tethys, or until the priestess awakens. Once you arrive at Shin-Tethys, you’ll link up with the port and deliver your charges’ remains.” He winced at that last characterization. “And you’ll have no problem with my leaving your employ at that point?” He winced again. “Am I correct? What about pay and working conditions?”

  He nodded slightly, then jerked upright, as if he had just caught himself falling asleep. (How long had he been awake anyway, doing everything himself?) “Pay will be ten fast dollars per diurn,” he announced brightly, “payable on arrival! Plus bunk and feedstock, and such medical cover as we can provide. Is that satisfactory?”

  “Huh. Normally, it would be, but this chapel has been damaged, hasn’t it? You mentioned a meltdown? And a dead doctor. If I incur medical needs that you can’t handle, then will you commit your Church to pay for my treatment on arrival? Up to and including a new body, if you manage to trash this one? Because it’s the only body I’ve got, and—”

  Dennett shuddered. “I think . . . yes, we should be able to cover that.” We? Now he was arguing with his socket-mounted siblings. Just what I needed!

  “And I want a guarantee that I will be allowed to leave when we arrive at Shin-Tethys. Shin-Tethys is my final destination. I’m signing in for a working passage, not a permanent berth. Yes?”

  I thought for a moment that I’d pushed him too far. The left side of his face puffed out and spiked up, the tips of his chromatophores suddenly burning crimson: “This is a vehicle of worship, not a slav
e ship, Ms. Alizond!” he snarled. “You impugn the honor of the Mother Church! I offer you the terms of the standard unskilled able spacer’s contract from the Ancient and Technical Guild of Taikonauts, and you have the effrontery to demand—”

  “Please!” I raised my hands palm out, trying to ward off the Bad Deacon who’d just risen to the surface: “I’m not trying to make obstacles! I’m just trying to understand the situation. I was told there was meat husbandry involved, not a crippled church with a short crew and a damaged reactor. All I want is an understanding that you’ll cover any repair costs I incur in working for you. Is that too much to ask for?”

  He took several deep breaths: As he did so, the spines of his cheek dimmed to pink and began to subside. “My. Apologies.” Another deep breath: “We—I—am still integrating. It’s noisy in here.” He tapped his head with one finger and smiled in a manner that was probably meant to be reassuring. “You were not misinformed about the meat—but we will not be able to carry out the holy insemination until our priestess is with us in body and soul once more. It’s quite likely that the new meat won’t be extruded by the Gravid Mother until after our arrival. So. Do you have any personal effects to retrieve? Because if so, you should do so immediately—we will depart as soon as we receive clearance. Your personal effects should mass no more than eight kilos, by the way. The longer we delay after the conjunction, the more of our maneuvering reserve we will need to expend.”

  “I travel light.” I patted my go bag. “I assumed you wouldn’t want to waste reaction mass on fripperies, so I brought everything I thought I’d need in the short term. Do you have a fab I can use for clothes and essentials . . . ?”

  “Yes, of course we do. Cook will show you how to use it in due course. Very well then.” He reached a decision. “Let me show you where you’ll be bunking and log you with the maintenance systems. There’s no time to lose.”

  * * *

  Only a couple of thousand seconds had passed when the travel agent received his second customer of the day.

  It was an entirely unexpected (but not unwelcome) surprise. Most people knew better than to look for cheap travel after conjunction, so only the desperate and the rich—or those with serious long-term plans—bothered to do so. Most of his competitors had shut up shop for the third of a standard year it would take until business picked up again: His main reason for staying open was that it gave him a competitive edge, and as a sole trader, that was something he needed. (When you’re a struggling sole trader, you need to take every opportunity that happenstance offers you.)

  When the fabric awning of his stall rippled to admit his new visitor, the agent was in repose, eyes closed and arms floating free before him, as if he were asleep. He wasn’t asleep but elsewhere, scanning the register of vehicle movements—so it took a few seconds for him to blink and adjust his posture, focusing on the new arrival.

  “Back so soon?” he asked, puzzled.

  She smiled. It was an insincere smile—quirked lips, bared teeth, widened eyes—a canned reflexive expression triggered by his attempt at social interaction.

  “My sib. Krina Alizond-114. Have you seen her?”

  The agent blinked, then focused on her. He had good eyes, the best he could afford: She was indeed very similar to the customer he had just assisted, but there were some differences that became apparent as he studied her. Her hair-growth pattern was different, still straight and dark and jagged-short, but sprouting slightly closer behind the ears: her pupils big and dark, the irises of her eyes a slightly different brown. Comparing her to his memory, he saw two gracile, slim, low-adipose females of indeterminate age, clad in similar colorful free-fall one-pieces, close enough to be—yes, sibs from the same lineage.

  “She was in here earlier today. Why? Can’t you call her?”

  The new woman’s face froze for a fraction of a second. “She’s off-net.”

  “Yes, of course she is. Listen, are you traveling with her? Because she’s booked on a short-notice departure, and it may already have left—”

  “Where is she?” The woman loomed over him. She was clearly eager to find her sib and not nearly as diffident.

  “I arranged a working passage for her aboard an itinerant chapel that put in for repairs a couple of million seconds ago.” He looked up at her face from below, registering her fixed expression, gaze focused almost behind his head. “It’s part of the Church of the Fragile. You can find her at this berth—” He rattled off the node number and directions.

  He expected some sort of acknowledgment or thanks for this information. And, indeed, she smiled as she absorbed it. But he didn’t see her smile, because she clamped her legs around his thorax and twisted his head right round, dislocating his neck. As his body began to twitch, she peeled open the slits on the back of his head, pulled out the soul chips nestling therein, and swallowed them. Then, before his spine could build out new connections and regain control of his body, she slid a new chip into one of the sockets and pushed it home: a scrambler, purpose-built to turn the finely weighted neural connectome inside the victim’s cranium into random noise.

  She carefully closed the curtain behind her as she left.

  * * *

  To continue where I left off:

  Dear Reader, you probably know all about my upbringing and mission because you are one of my sisters.

  But if you are not, if you’re some stranger wondering why this long-delayed expenses claim form is getting in the way of your regular workflow, and why I am so desperate to get to Shin-Tethys that I am willing to work my passage on a damaged church run by a mad priest who is trying to simultaneously integrate multiple death-traumatized personalities, well—it’s a long story. And it will be even longer if we need to pause to examine the fundamentals of identity. For example, it’s possible that you are a Fragile person, bound by raw biology to exist in certain tightly constrained biospheres, with a linear identity from extrusion to death. Or you might be a Lobster-person, wet and squishy within a hard-shell, vacuum-proof carapace. We may well be members of different human subspecies, adapted to the exigencies of different worlds. You might be a near contemporary of mine, or you might be reading this at some huge remove of deep time—thousands or millions of standard years after my senescence and obsolescence. Just as individuals age and die, so do lineages: Only debt is forever. So I’m not going to explore all the ramifications of my identity. Instead, here’s the capsule version:

  I’m Krina Alizond-114, a mu-female by genderplan, of roughly traditional sapiens phenotype, and of middle age by the reckoning of my type. Which is to say, I am over a hundred standard years old, but still retain some mental agility: I have a century or more before I begin the long slide down into stasis, and with various cognitive treatments, neural senescence may be staved off indefinitely. Physical age is, of course, irrelevant—if maintained correctly, we do not deteriorate over time. Nor is my kind particularly vulnerable to radiation damage. The ’cytes from which our bodies are constructed are designed, not evolved, so that while we approximate a Fragile human in outward morphology, we’re far more robust and can operate in a much wider range of environments. We’re no more intelligent, alas—there are complexity issues involved in building better brains that preclude progress unless we are willing to become something not even remotely human—but you can’t have everything.

  Back in the dawn of history, the Fragile created our ancestors to serve them, making us in their own image—robots, they called the first people of our kind—shortly before they became extinct for the first time. Since then, we’ve prospered and spread: We’ve even resurrected our creators on at least three occasions. But they are vulnerable and easily damaged, codependent on the ecosystem of related species they evolved among. With a handful of exceptions (domed habitats on a few not-entirely-hostile planets; and, of course, the cathedrals of the Church of the Fragile) they don’t flourish away from their home world. Unlike us.

/>   I was created aboard a free-flying habitat, New California, en voyage from Gliese 581c4 to somewhere forgettable. (Destinations are of no significance to migratory habs other than as sources of resupply—unlike colony ships, to whose voyages there is a very definite end in mind, free-flyers are worlds unto themselves.) I’m a member of the Alizond lineage, an old and prestigious sisterhood. Over my first decades, I paid off my instantiation debt and worked my way up the family firm until I became a senior partner in the statistical research division of the bank. However, I am not actually an expert in banking. Rather, my specialty was more long-term and abstract: I’m a scholar of the historiography of accountancy and a leading specialist in one particularly recondite corner of that field.

  (A historian who works for a bank: That’s not the most likely background for someone who capers around the cosmos having adventures, is it? Bear with me, though, and all shall become clear.)

  Back on New California, I lived and worked for the family firm in one of my mother’s palaces, on a seashore overlooking a hillside that slopes down to a bay, where the green-tinted waves wash gently across the glittering black sands. (Did I mention that New California, by the standards of spacegoing habs, is immense?) The palace, over three hundred standard years old and built in an archaic, historical style even then, was a haven of tranquillity; my office quarters were spacious and comfortable, opening inward onto the cloister surrounding the sisterhood’s museum of antiquities (of which I was one of the part-time volunteer curators). A visiting architectural critic once memorably (and uncharitably) described the palace as a dusty tomb full of dried-up nun-accountants, but I would take issue with that description: There’s nothing ascetic about it, and in any case, it was my home.