Just Out of Jupiter's Reach (The Far Reaches, #5)

by Nnedi Okorafor

Long-term memory is a thing of the past.

when you have to earn it, it’s actually not at all like winning the lottery.

I had dreams and nightmares that were vivid and new. But that last one’s why they were so confident that it would work: I was seeing my ship’s mind in my sleep even before the official imprinting.

So they saw the money, but at the same time, it was hard for them to see me as important.

Interesting how we tend to associate strength with something hard like diamond, tungsten, stone. Never with something that is flesh, something that yields.

But my Miri, whom I’d named Chi (because it was the personification of my fate, my guardian spirit), made me understand that I would never be alone again.

They were powerful, even sentient creatures, and they were our freedom . . . in a way. Each one imprinted on only one human being, if Kármán could find that one.

But Kármán said this one meeting of seven days would be fine. After that, we were to be alone for the rest of the five years before returning to Earth, if we chose to. If any of us broke this rule and traveled together, we’d forfeit the remaining millions we would earn in that time. Always the threat of losing what we were owed. Typical capitalism.

“I’m a trans woman in space hugging my beautiful black sisters in a living ship! I don’t even care how weird this is,” Gracious announced.

“I’m out here just out of reach of Jupiter,” I said. “What makes you think I’m typical?”

And my time alone had been a journey of breaking and then healing . . . all alone.

Not for the first time, I wondered just how much the five years alone had eroded our social skills.

‘You were our tornado tonight. Beautiful, swift, lethal, a force of nature.’