To say that I was nervous to have Shaw sitting back in my heart was would be an understatement. It hadn’t been hours since the man had held me and Doc at knife-point, but now he sat on the same medical bed that I often slept on, getting a bullet dug out of his calf.

“The shooting thing really wasn’t necessary, you know.” Shaw muttered to Doc, who was gathering a small bin full of surgical tools “All you had to say was you’re not bringing me to those Skull fucks anymore and I’d play along. Those bastards are unhinged, would’ve killed me.” It was remarkable just how unbearable he could continue to be after being so thoroughly put into place by the captain.

“That had been the plan, yes.” Joel retorted, still standing at the other side of the room with his rifle in hand. It helped ease some of us who’d had to feel his blade at our necks before.

Shaw did a double take back to Joel “Oh, they’d told you. Explains the hush hush treatment. Don’t want to tell someone to their face that they’re gonna die.”

“No, you’re just really annoying.” I piped in through the intercom.

He put his head back and huffed “Can’t believe I’m being disrespected by a starship now. Will you at least quit it with the implant, that hurts you know.”

“Bullshit.” I laughed silently. I wasn’t about to just let him have access to his weapon again. “I’m loaded with implants, a little unhandled error in them doesn’t cause any kind of feedback.”

“Can’t blame me for trying.” He shrugged “But really, I don’t plan on trying that again now. You’re really doing me a favor, taking me to Venus, if there’s really that many warships at Luna. I’m not exactly on Foundation’s nice list either. Can’t say I like that I’m surrounded by people in the same boat though.”

“They probably just saw our handle and thought they’d try to take us in while they’re there, they’re not gonna pursue us.” Joel rationalized “If they brought that many ships just for us, they’re shittier tacticians than I thought they were. Probably already starting a war with the pirate gangs just going this far.”

“What if they are after us though?” I asked, I didn’t like the idea that there might be a literal army out just to find me.

“Then these guys are probably just gonna dump you on Venus so they can save themselves.” Shaw said in a matter-of-fact tone “It’s what I’d do.”

“Well we’re not you.” Joel growled angrily “Much as I still don’t trust her with my life, that’s only cause she’s too green. Meryll’s one of us now. Captain wouldn’t ditch her and neither would I.” I was actually surprised to hear that come out of Joel’s mouth. I wouldn’t have guessed that he would stand up for me like that at all.

“Wow… thanks Joel.” I transmitted, trying to make sure I emphasized that I was being genuine “That actually means a lot coming from you.”

“Yeah, yeah, you giant rustbucket, don’t go crying on me again, don’t need captain flipping me into more shelving.” He muttered, trying to sound hostile and failing spectacularly.

“Big happy family on this ship, are you?” Shaw grunted as Doc pushed him to lay down a little rougher than he had to and put his hands on the man’s bleeding leg.

Part of me did want to make another ping to see if we were being followed, now that we were on our way away from Earth’s proximity, but Aisling had already warned me that it was a two-way signal. It was fine to do while we were in a high traffic area in orbit around Luna since the ping was anonymous, but drawing attention to ourselves out in wild space was asking for trouble. “Say, what’s on Venus anyway. I thought humanity ditched that colony.” I said slowly, hoping that it wasn’t another falsehood implanted in me, like the Dario.

“Colonizing Venus itself is impossible.” Doc explained “The terraforming it needs would be a whole new scientific field to undertake. It’s not worth anyone’s time. The Venus colony is just a space station in orbit around Venus.

“Doc’ll feel right at home.” Joel smirked.

“I won’t.” He replied as he began to reach into the small wound on Shaw’s leg, fishing around for the bullet with a magnetic prong.

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“Ah…” Shaw grunted “Never been to the inner colonies?” Shaw asked.

Knowing it must have been addressed to me, I sighed into the lubricant. I really didn’t want to talk to this man any more than I had to “No. I haven’t.” I left it at that, not wanting to get into my more recently discovered memory issues with the man.

“You know, they’re probably gonna want a good look at you on Venus if they learn about you.” Shaw warned, stopping to inhale through his teeth as Doc extracted the tiny hunk of metal from the wound and put it into a tray “Venus is a research station.”

“Research station?” I repeated “Why would there be a research station in the inner colonies? I thought corporations abandoned this place.”

“Other than the occasional secret experiment and gang war now, I guess.” Joel muttered.

“It’s not a corporate research facility.” Doc said as he began to pour alcohol over the man’s wound “It’s independent. It’s run by an obscenely rich, criminally eccentric man named William Skygraves, obsessed with learning the secret to immortality.” He sounded gravely serious as he spoke despite the obvious contempt he had for the very idea “He respects all of the sciences. He does his own work in several fields, biology, computer science, physics, but his station’s a haven for all sorts of researchers and inventors who are free to pursue their own work under his protection. Suppose he believes that if he brings enough brilliant minds together, someone’s going to solve his problem with him.”

“So there’s a scientist utopia orbiting Venus?” I asked skeptically “What’s the catch?”

“Surprisingly, not much. Man genuinely believes that people will naturally come to collaborate on a solution to the age-old problem of… well, age.” Doc practically spat his words. He had a history with the subject, it seemed. “I shudder to think what the place will be like without him though. Skygraves is, ironically, getting older. I think the place might descend into chaos if the ‘benevolent’ dictator starts to go mad in desperation.”

“I take it he’s not close to his solution, then?” I asked. Surely, this man must have acquired his wealth in some horrible way just like all the richest people back on Titan, but it was somehow still sad, or rather pitiable, that there was a man so obsessed with escaping mortality that he’d spent everything he had on its pursuit and still failed.

“Well, there is no solution.” Doc answered candidly “People live and then they die. There’s no way to stop time for a human body. We can’t just halt our biology, it’s a fantasy. Maybe we could find a way to computerize and upload our consciousness, but that wouldn’t be immortality, that would just be making a copy of ourselves. And we’re not even anywhere near having the technology to do that. The man’s a quack who’s easy for other eccentrics to take advantage of when they need to work in a place with less regulation.”

“Sounds like you’re not a big fan?” I asked.

“Well, I watch them closely. They release fascinating studies and make technological advances in spades that are usually quickly bought out by corporate interests once it gets back to them.” He started, wrapping a bandage around Shaw’s leg “They’re mad, all of them, but they’re effective. And they’re not directly, themselves, corporations. They mostly do this for the science. So we should be safe there.”

“They’re a strange lot, that’s for sure.” Shaw agreed, grunting as he felt at the closed wound “Bad business men in general. Would make good marks if they weren’t such good sources of information. Better to stay on their good side.”

“Would they know anything about a sentient ship core?” I asked eagerly.

“If there’s one place in the universe besides the heart of a corporate headquarters that would, it’d be Venus.” Shaw shrugged “Might know a couple people in the right fields, if I could get a little bit of leniency around here.”

“Bad idea. They might not be corpos, but they would still sell you out. You’re probably not on their radar yet, so it’s a better idea to lay low.” Joel muttered.

“For once, Joel’s right.” Doc said, making Joel shake his head and snort in feigned irritation “We don’t know any Venusians we can trust to not signal Foundation. It’s just going to be a place for us to hide out while Luna’s under siege.” He patted Shaw’s arm and wheeled back from the bed, starting to put tools into a sink “As for you, don’t do anything too stressful on that leg.”

“What would I even do?” Shaw demanded “I’m still a prisoner.”

“Captain’s letting you be one small step above prisoner.” Joel corrected begrudgingly “You’re still a piece of shit who we’re watching like hawks, but you’re allowed to walk the ship. You’ll always have a gun pointed at you, and you’re not allowed anywhere near the bridge at all. Be glad she wouldn’t listen to my advice to just pack you in a crate and kick you out the airlock.”

Doc and Joel were right. The risk of trying to contact someone who might know what’s happening with me and ending up in a lab for the rest of my life was too great. Still, Shaw’s offer was at least a little tempting, even if I didn’t trust him for a moment to be on the straight and narrow with me. “You can handle him, right Joel?” I asked.

Joel huffed “Course. You act like you were doing something useful to look over him. Go on, get outta here.”

I rolled my eyes and floated up into the helm, where Aisling still sat at her desk, monitoring signals around us closely. I may not have been able to give a larger scope of movement around the system, but I could at least give her a hand with local scans to make sure that there weren’t any stray rocks that I might have missed if I was preoccupied.

As the ping went out, however, I didn’t expect that I’d see a nearby ship’s return signal…