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A HEAVINESS HAD SETTLED over the ship worse than any Kes had known in the decade-long voyage. The nightly drinking sessions had ended. When people weren’t working they mostly kept to their cabins, coming out only to collect food. In the passageways, no one made eye contact, keeping their heads down and their gazes focused on the deck. The place was eerily quiet. No sound of conversation was to be heard, no strains of music or vid audio tracks leaked from cabins or communal rooms, only the far-distant thrum of the engine as it carried them steadily and faithfully across abyssal space.
He tried to pretend to Miki and Nina that everything was okay, but they’d grown too big to fool. Too big and too smart. Initially, they’d been disappointed the ship hadn’t reached Earth, but life on
