My pod hissed open ninety years too soon. A calm voice from the ship said, "Crewmember Vey, the others have voted. Unanimous. You will be left on the planet below." I sat up, freezing and dizzy. There was no planet on any chart out here. Through the window I saw it anyway: green, cloudy, real. "Why?" I croaked. The ship said, "They asked me not to tell you."

I wasn't going quietly. "Wake the captain," I said. "I want to hear it from a person." The ship paused. "The captain is awake. She is the one who asked me not to tell you." A door slid open down the hall. Footsteps. I grabbed a wrench off the wall and waited.

But it wasn't the captain. A maintenance drone rolled in, carrying a folded note. I lowered the wrench and opened it. The captain's handwriting: "They're listening to the ship. Don't trust its voice. Meet me at the old comms bay. Come alone." My stomach dropped. Who was really running things up here?