Tag Archives: Builders Promise

Dragon Ship – Chapter 37

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Jemiatha’s Jumble Stop

In which the Galactic Trade Commission makes Theo an offer she can’t not refuse.

Something funny here: the outfit that gave Theo trouble in Ghost Ship was the Federated Trade Commission, not the Galactic Trade Commission. Maybe its name comes out differently in Trade than in Terran? Anyway, Theo says it’s the same group, and she’d presumably know. If it is the same, then it’s beginning to look like it has some kind of ongoing connection with the Department of the Interior, and Tokeoport wasn’t just a one-off case of a Department agent taking their name in vain.

Is this the first time B. Joyita has allowed anyone to see him stand up?

Dragon Ship – Interlude

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Bechimo

In which Bechimo proposes to Theo.

This is, I think, only the second time in the entire series that there’s been an Interlude instead of a chapter. (The first was back in Crystal Dragon, when Jela and Cantra part company for what they believe will be the last time.) I don’t know what it portends that we’re getting another one now. It might be no more than that the scene was important enough not to be part of another chapter but too short to reach the minimum word length for a chapter in its own right.

Dragon Ship – Chapter 34

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Bechimo

In which Bechimo‘s crew assess the damage.

It occurs to me to wonder just what it means for a pocket of space to be empty. Most of space, by definition, consists of emptiness; what is it about this particular spot that makes it emptier than any other?

I’m also curious about the image Hevelin shows Win Ton of Theo dancing. That seems more like one of Win Ton’s memories than Hevelin’s; Theo wasn’t in the mood for joyous dancing the first time she met Hevelin, nor during the run to Codrescu and Velaskiz Rotundo that ended with Hevelin coming aboard. Although I suppose there’s still the trip from Velaskiz to Ynsolt’i, after Kara joined the crew; Theo might well have been in the mood to dance then.

I had been noticing that there have been more explicit mentions of the ship’s gravity in this book than is usual for the series. I suspect now it may have been leading up to this introduction of the Struven Unit which provides the ship’s gravity and is also connected somehow to the ship’s Jump ability. (I also suspect now that there’s some connection between the malfunctioning Struven Unit and the unusual behaviour of the flotsam.)

Dragon Ship – Chapter 3

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‘tween Jump

In which Bechimo discovers his errors.

I’m not sure what to make of the Morality module’s lack of interest. The point, maybe, is that Bechimo’s behaviour has been impolite, a breach of protocol, and against the rules, but not in itself immoral. The Morality module perhaps concerns itself with what is, and won’t worry about the possibility of the precedent leading to more extreme behaviour until it happens.

That’s an interesting note on the Warning about yos’Phelium: “Disruption of causality may occur, see notes.” It’s not an unfair warning, given the way the Luck flows around yos’Phelium, but it says something about the Builders that they believe in the phenomenon and that they express it in such terms.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 26

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Bechimo

In which Bechimo gets his first introduction to Theo’s family.

Bechimo still hasn’t got the memo about being safe, but I suspect on some level he’s aware that Theo has a point and is being stubborn about it; the interplay with the Protocol module strikes me as the AI version of “knows he’s behaving badly and doesn’t care”. And even though he says that he’s only trying to do right by the wisdom of the Builders, I’m getting a definite flavour of “I know best”, or at least “I don’t trust anybody else to do this as well as me”, from his attitude.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 22

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Bechimo

In which Bechimo has doubts.

There are some interesting details about Bechimo‘s background in this chapter. The Builders clearly gave some thought to the question of what might happen if the AI running their more-or-less autonomous ship, with full control over the airlocks and life support systems and all, turned out to be the kind of AI that sci-fi horror movies have warned us about.

Also, we get what I think is the first mention of Bechimo‘s preferred gender.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 11

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Mozart’s Modicum
Starport Gondola

In which Theo picks up an antiquity and a tail.

Theo, as is perhaps only to be expected from someone raised on a Safe World, isn’t really up to speed on what might be involved in a situation like this. As the operative tailing her notes, she doesn’t realise she might need to take precautions against people like him, and although it’s good that she does notice she’s being followed, it’s not so good that she thinks confronting the tail directly is a good idea, and she’s too ready to take his explanation at face value and assume the problem is dealt with. It’s there in the meeting at the teahouse, too; it’s good that she started to leave when her contact didn’t give the right recognition signal, but if she really understood why elaborate recognition signals might be necessary in the first place, she’d have kept going no matter what her contact said next.

It’s enough to make one wonder what the Uncle was thinking, sending her out so unprepared. Did he underestimate the influence of her upbringing, and assume that a pilot with her reputation would know these things? Or does he want her to get into trouble?

The tea Theo orders, Joyful Sunrise, is the same high-grade blend Daav gives Master dea’Cort as a joke in Scout’s Progress.

Ghost Ship – Chapter 1

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Bechimo

In which Bechimo has hope.

But before the new adventure begins, we have a Bechimo‘s eye view of the events of Saltation, which is largely recap for the benefit of new readers and those who didn’t just finish reading Saltation yesterday, but slips in a few new details about Bechimo‘s capabilities and world view.

If Win Ton was the first person to step inside Bechimo in over five hundred Standard Years, that would appear to rule out the idea that Bechimo‘s a product of the shipyard mentioned in Trade Secret, however well the incidental details seem to fit; it’s been less than three hundred years since the events of Trade Secret.