Von Squidgie Worth The First Esquire was taking a rare moment of peace and quiet to balance their own internal debits and credits.

Accounting of themselves.

What was their goals? What were they worth? What did they have? What would it cost?

What did they owe?

The balancing and counting of the tallies and values and intricate web of favors. The marking of discrepancies to address, of debts left unresolved. Promises unfulfilled.

They had not yet realized their place on the ship. The landscape of needs and values and requirements was complex. It was something that required care and gentle positioning. They were not yet supporting those they cared about. And at the center of it were two categories, Crew and Passenger.

They were realizing that a simple little Cleric Passenger would never be enough to satisfy and support everything the way that Squidgie Worth wanted too.

But there was something harsh and painful in Ship Mistress Pylo about the very hint of additional crew. She was constantly and unendingly flinching and shying from even the thought of adding them.

The signs were all there, the Siren was actively sabotaging literally any chance of ever having another entity added on as crew. Even having anything resembling automation. Some of the measures taken were patterns that Squidgie suspected that not even Pylo was aware of anymore. Something dug deep into her and the Ship’s systems to drive her away from ever giving in to it.

The activity had likely been going on for Terran Centuries of ship time, possibly even longer!

But the only balm for what ailed the Ship Mistress was support and an easing of her burdens.

Tunie and Pylo needed more Crew.

And it would take dozens of dozens of Clerics to fill any role of Crew.

But Pylo was crippled and in a contorted agony on that subject. Every additional crew member was going to be a traumatizing lance, Squidgie was sure of it. Adding dozens of the Clerics needed would be too much for the Siren, it would end horribly if that was pressed or even suggested.

So the number had to be significantly lower, with individuals that could be trusted by the siren and slowly and gently ease the pain unofficially as they settle into the positions naturally. Let the Siren heal enough to accept the support openly.

Pylo needed crew, a small group of extremely capable experts.

And thus any of them that currently resided as passengers on Tunie that wanted to begin needed to become more.

Squidgie gave a heavy shake and felt the easing of uncertainty in the balance.

They needed to become more.

Acknowledging that fully felt like a great relief. Freeing Squidgies eye to consider the paths and deficits in the matter.

They were poorly suited physically for a start, So was pylo, there was far too much metabolic excess in either of them traversing Tunie under acceleration.

But there was already a wonderful and admirable pattern for solving that one. And it dovetailed so beautifully in the other goals that Squidgie had for the future. Yes, regardless of whether Miss Aleph chose to join Squidgie in this endeavor it would be good and right to honor her with the choice.

Bipedalism was well suited and energy efficient for traversing acceleration.

The necessary surgeries and specifics of the implementation would still need to be drawn up and done but it was a start. Massive caloric savings all around.

Honestly Squidgie was feeling kind of light and fluttery in their spiracles and digestive arteries.

It was just so right to acknowledge and admit that had been the plan all along.

To not grow old and encrusted into a can. To take on and mirror the beauty and grace of Miss Aleph instead!

To be at least in this manner Terran.

Squidgie trembled and shifted a few parameters in the future plans, they... no She would do this. She would make herself anew, strain herself anew, make herself more than any mere Clerik could hope to be.

Although there was of course the terrible price. No matter the terran memetics a core instinct feared it. Sure, *given* the assumption that she'd keep moving under acceleration, it balanced out, but...

Her flesh could never be allowed to settle into the restfulness of old age. Never to shed the childish visceras and metabolism of youth. She would have to live forever days away from starvation instead of months. She could never let a single shred or fibre of her being relax, grow gentled or complacent.

A restless itch in her mind would be burned into place in a way her psyche was not made to endure.

She would have to burn with the intensity of fierce painful poverty for the rest of her days no matter how rich she became.

She would never naturally be able to survive quickening her own eggs.

It was so much to pay.

But Von Squidgie Worth The First Esquire had done a balance of herself. Of all she cared about, of all that mattered to her.

She had counted and multiplied the balance of all the quantities.

She had tabulated the pains of subtle and endless anguish that her brain would burn under.

She had weighed the cost of never having her flesh bulge and swell with the eggs of future children.

Never let her immune system retire with her security and safety.

The stress of always living on a knifes edge of ruin and death as far as her every cell will be concerned.

But the cost was justified.

The returns of her goals, of her loved ones, of her mistress Aleph’s security?

Squidgie saw the price and found she would accept a thousand times more for what she would gain.

But of course she would only pay the absolute minimum for that prize.

She was not stupid after all.

Eternal torturous youth onto death for a chance to save all she cared about in the whole reef?

That seemed quite a fair transaction indeed.