The shuttle shudders as it passes through max Q. Electric blue atmosphere transitions to navy, to indigo, then to pure black. The turbulence suddenly smooths out and anything not bolted down starts to float.

"Out the gate," Gun drawls from the pilot seat.

Jr grunts an acknowledgement, but doesn't look up from a map of the Exclusion Zone in his lap.

Docking is finicky, time-consuming work. Gallifax cranes her neck to see out of the cockpit windows while Brakes snores beside her. The USRS Pax hangs in high orbit. It's a sleek civilian vessel that's part of the United Sol Research and Survey fleet, but it's dwarfed by the USS Rubicon above it, which is blocky, grey, and scored by a recent burn. If they were anywhere else in the Orion Arm, she'd guess the ship skinned a star's prominence. But near the Regulus system, there's another explanation: Thread's kin.

She waits for Thread to make some sort of response, but it stays still. The USRS Pax takes up more and more of her view. Gun patiently manoeuvres their shuttle into an orbit that will intersect their parent ship. Shadows cut across the dashboard and it's only through visual cues that she knows they're rotating onto their side. The shuttle sidles up to the underside of Pax in complete silence while the bright blue curve of M-284 glows below. They slip into darkness just as docking port lights flash on.

"Fuck you!" Gun leans forward in his seat. "Fucking blinding me, you fuck."

A strange skittery sound is audible over his comm. It's the Giridese equivalent of laughter.

"Play nice," Jr says blandly.

Brakes snorts and jerks awake in his harness. "What?"

"Legs flashed Gun again." Gallifax yawns until her jaw clicks. "The usual shit."

"Better not pull that with the marines."

Jr glares at him, but the man has a point. Legs still struggles with theory of mind. Giridese communicate with each other at the quantum level. Information is dispersed instantly across enormous distances. If Legs tells one person something, xe expects the rest of humanity to know. The idea that people act as individuals with discrete thoughts and motives simply confounds xim. Piling on the nuances of etiquette, hierarchy, and politics is futile.

"At least xe's stopped collecting our hair." Gallifax rubs her left eye. "Take your wins where you can."

Gun clears his throat. "Except for mine."

"Except for yours," she amends. "But you're a legs man, aren't you?"

Everyone keeps quiet after that.