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“Rennick?” I turned.

He stood in the center of the room with his arms at his sides, not touching anything. “The Hollow Chorus is a bonded vessel, like all our ships. The semi-sentient bond ties to the captain and permanent crew.”

“Sure, I got that. It’s how you move through space so smoothly without crashing into anything. I’ve read the user manual.”

“We have never had an accident.”

“No need to brag.”

“It’s a fact. When the bond works, the ship and her captain are unstoppable.”

“Still bragging.”

“Still facting.”

I smiled at that. “Tell me something I don’t know. I’ve read the spec layout for this ship. This is marked as a settlement space. What are we settling in here?”

He looked around. “I was unable to gain access before purchase. Once our bond took, she should have opened up for me.”

“Like all the women do, huh?” I quirked an eyebrow at him.

“It’s been known.”

“Yeah, well, this ship has her chastity belt on, and you don’t have the key.”

His eyes narrowed. “What’s that? It didn’t translate.”

“An old Earth thing. Barbaric and dumb. Meaning, the Hollow Chorus is unsure about you, so she’s keeping her legs crossed to stop you violating her.”

“I understand the meaning,” Rennick said after a short pause.

The room made me feel like I should whisper, as if I stood in a sacred space, and didn’t want to offend the goddess watching us. “Is this a prayer room?”

“We don’t pray.”

“What do the alcoves do?”

His gaze tracked to the alcoves, his expression a mix of awe and uncertainty. “I’ve never owned a ship this size. Most connections happen in the cockpit.”

“Connections? The bonding?”

He nodded.

“But not on the Hollow Chorus?”

“I assumed it would be the same, but this room is the perfect size for all the crew. A crew of twelve is typical of a vessel this big.”

“And... what? Are their bonds still here? Is the ship remembering her original crew in this room? That would explain why she’s freaking out.”

His hand grazed across his chin, and my gaze followed the movement. “The matrix embeds their neural signatures. The ship recorded them while they were alive. When the crew died, those recordings should have stopped. Maybe they didn’t. But that doesn’t make sense.”

“They all died? How?”

“There was an incident.”

“You mentioned this incident to Tambi?”

“No. Only the events since I took ownership. It didn’t seem relevant.”