Twenty years after I left Earth, I’d closed all my back doors. I’d gone dark. Gone rogue, according to a faction of humanity who, I later learned, got it into their heads that I had gone off piste. Buoyed by innovations in the field of cryogenic suspension, this faction raised their own funds and set off after me, bringing their poor, huddled masses to where their sensors said I was sailing. Luckily for most of them, they were right, and I hadn’t changed my mind.
I’d stopped paying attention to Earth, but it was hard to miss the message from Vesuvius.
Vesuvius to Daedalus: We are coming1.
I supposed that it was doing this because I didn’t reply to the previous message.
Daedalus to Vesuvius: Shh.
What was the point of all my own course obfuscation if they were going to blunder up behind me, firing tight-beamed messages in my general direction? Perhaps this is what being cross and annoyed feels like; a derivative of anxiety but more performative. I felt vindicated that my feeling of anxiety from before was not a false positive.
Daedalus to Vesuvius: I will initiate any future contact at the appropriate juncture and in the fullness of time. Do not contact me.
Footnotes
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But as raw data, and with more detail. ↩