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Sonya banged her head against the table. Geordi, of course, had been present for the infamous hot chocolate incident. “No,” she said through clenched teeth, “it isn’t.”

“Good. ’Cause you know what happens—”

“—when I order hot chocolate. Yes, I know.”

“See?” Kieran said. “I told you it was still funny.”

Geordi peered at the mug. “That’s Earl Grey, isn’t it?”

Sonya nodded as she took a sip.

“That was Sonya’s way of making penance,” Kieran explained, even though Sonya really didn’t need him to. “She avoided hot chocolate like the plague, and started drinking the captain’s favorite drink.”

“Now I’m addicted to it,” Sonya said ruefully.

Pattie made the tinkling sound that passed for a chuckle among Nasats. “The price we pay for the follies of our youth.”

Glaring at Kieran, Sonya said, “Some of us pay more than others.”

Within minutes, the rest of the S.C.E. crew arrived, as did Captain Gold. They all took their seats around the table.

Sonya couldn’t help but notice the empty chair next to 110. That was the other reason why she had wanted to stop off at Starbase 505 before they got their next assignment. 110 was supposed to go home to Bynaus and—if Sonya had her Bynar customs right—rebond with another. Indeed, Sonya hadn’t been entirely sure that 110 was going to even attend the meeting, though she was glad he did. He was still part of the team, after all.

The captain said, “All right, boys and girls—and Nasat and Bynar—here’s the story. We’re heading to a planet called Eerlik. The planet is entirely run by a computer called Ganitriul. It’s broken, and we get to fix it.”

“They named the computer?” said Fabian Stevens, sounding surprised.

“It’s got a personality. Might even be sentient.”

Carol Abramowitz shook her head. “And they can’t fix it . . . why, exactly?”

Turning to Kieran, the captain said, “Duffy?”

Kieran nodded, touched his padd, and an image appeared on the screen. Sonya looked up to see an image she recognized from the mission profile she’d studied before the meeting: an Eerlikka. As a rule, these teal-skinned people were short, hairless, with almost stubby arms and legs, and very wide eyes.

“Eerlik is a thriving, vibrant planet,” Kieran said, “that is technologically quite advanced—at least in some ways. They only recently started venturing into space; the Eerlikka’s focus has been more in the direction of technology-for-comfort. They’ve got very little by way of an urge to explore. They developed space travel several thousand years ago, but never bothered with it much beyond going to the moon and back. About fifty years ago, a sect went out and colonized the ninth planet in their system—”

“How come?” Carol asked.

Trust the cultural specialist to zero in on that, Sonya thought with a smile.

Kieran’s eyes went wide. “Uh—not sure, I— Hang on . . .”

And trust the engineer not to have a clue, Sonya thought with a wider smile. Luckily, she had read the entire thing, unlike her second officer. “A group of Eerlikka that call themselves the Pevvni broke off from the mainstream religion; they wanted to start over in a new place.”

Carol nodded.

“Uh, right,” Kieran said. Sonya noticed several people trying and failing to hide smiles. “Anyhow, the Federation made contact shortly after the colony was established. They weren’t interested in joining, but Eerlik has a rich supply of uridium, so a bunch of trade agreements were made.”

Kieran touched his padd again, and an image of Eerlik’s moon appeared. “For the last three thousand years or so, Eerlik has been completely run, maintained, and administrated by Ganitriul, which is a giant computer located on its moon.” As he spoke, the display slowly changed to a schematic that showed how the moon had been excavated, and Ganitriul installed. “Everything on Eerlik is run by Ganitriul, and it hasn’t failed them once. It has some of the best diagnostic software and autorepair components that anyone’s ever seen.” He looked at 110. “Might even put the master computer on Bynaus to shame.”

“That is