“Go,” Mother whispers, “you’re our last chance.”

I stand, confused, as she presses an activation key into my right hand, then runs along the corridor towards my father and the mob pressing against the hangar’s blast doors.

*

We’ve been spacers all our lives, living on the margins of existence. Trading goods wherever we can make credits, salvaging wreckage, fighting off pirates and raiders. The Federal Planetary Government doesn’t hold much sway out in the void, even though they’re becoming more authoritarian and imperialistic on the inhabited worlds. Rebellious types from beat poets to guerrilla militias had been crushed mercilessly according to rumour, but Father had dismissed the hearsay with a wave of his hand.

“No matter to us, girlie,” he’d said. “Go help your mother with the hull repairs.”